Design of wedding dresses "too nerve-wracking" for John Rocha
The Hong Kong-born designer is famed for his feminine aesthetic, and loves working with natural fabrics. Although many of his pieces have a romantic quality about them, John has only ever created one wedding dress, for his wife Odette, as he hates putting himself under too much pressure.
"It`s too nerve-wracking," he explained, "because if anything goes wrong you will ruin the big day. I did do Odette`s, it was ivory silk, 1930s-ish."
John and Odette married in 1990, and he says she is invaluable when he is designing. She tells him what works and what isn`t quite right, and he always takes her opinion on board. "You do need someone whose opinion you trust because it can be quite lonely. You can`t make every decision yourself," he explained.
John moved to the UK in the 1970s, and originally planned to be a psychiatric nurse. He met a friend who was a fashion designer, and decided that career sounded fun.
He studied at a college in Croydon, London , and then fell in love with Irish fabrics during a trip to the country. He was sponsored by a mill which provided him with cloth for his final college collection, and still has a studio in Ireland .
"I am a great believer in natural fibre. The foundation of my career is about beautiful linen and handcraft. It`s my ambition to bring handcraft into a modern form," he told British newspaper The Independent. "If I didn`t have a break after each collection I don`t think I would be as excited about fashion as I still am."
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