Fashion

Glynis Robins’s new clothing owes a debt to Harry Clarke

Clothes, poetry and stained glass: Glynis Robins fuses art and fashion

First panel: Aine wears cream silk velvet caftan trimmed with black braid and gold antique tassels. Handknit black lurex open-lace scarf. Silk cummerbund all over silk skirt edge with gold braid. Photograph: Barry McCall

Deirdre McQuillan's face
Deirdre McQuillan
Sat Jan 8 2022 - 00:00

Glynis Robins brings an artistic touch to everything she creates whether in her garden, her home or in the wonderful clothing she once made and sold in her shop in Dalkey. People will remember the hand embellishment, the knitting, crochet, embroidery and beading that became her signature.

Now, however, having moved to Bray, Co Wicklow, painting and drawing have become her focus as well as her fairytale two-acre woodland garden.

In her studio, a converted hay barn attached to the house, she has just completed a very special art meets fashion project, a collection of clothes based on Harry Clarke’s stained-glass depictions of JM Synge’s 1902 poem Queens written in Wicklow which begins “Seven dog days we let it pass/Naming the Queens in Glenmacnass/All the rare and royal names/Wormy sheepskin yet retains.”

Etain: Aine wears fine blue cord kimono coat over white silk satin dress and antique lace frill skirt, white lace and blue crochet headdress. Helen: Abbey wears blue and gold embroidered wrap skirt, gold lame wrap top, blue cotton handknit hooded scarf, turquoise and green silk chiffon wrap. Maeve: Maria in navy blue beaded dress with hand crochet lace shrug and silver lace headdress. Deirdre: Thalia in blue silk devore dress with blacksilk appliqued belt and antique white lace shawl, blue crochet headdress. Fand: Teo wears long black handknit cardigan with black lurex hooded scarf. Aqua silk dress and pale green antique lace skirt and embroidered silk shawl. Photograph: Barry McCall

Designed in several panels, it mirrors the nine intricately drawn then subsequently painted by Clarke on layered panels of glass etched through to as many as six tones of ultramarine blue, sumptuous gold pink, rich ruby, blue and blue again (according to Nicola Gordon Bowe’s description in her book on Harry Clarke) “each queen fantastically depicted whether exotically beautiful, pockmarked, villainous or alluring”.

READ MORE

Second panel. Etain: Aine wears fine blue cord kimono over white silk satin dress and antique lace frill skit. White lace and blue crochet headdress. Helen: Abby wears blue and gold embroidered wrap skirt, gold lame wrap top, blue cotton handknit hooded scarf and turquoise and green silk chiffon wrap. Maeve: Maria wears navy blue beaded slip dress with hand crochet lace shrug and silver lace headdress. Deirdre: Thalia wears blue silk devore dress with black silk appliqued belt and antique white lace shawl. Blue crochet headdress. Fand: Teo wears long black handknit cardigan with black lurex handkit hooded scarf. Aqua silk slip dress and pale green antique lace skirt and embroidered greens silk shawl. Photograph: Barry McCall

Reading about Clarke’s drawings and panels in a magazine some years ago gave Robins the idea of responding by making 28 corresponding outfits in an undertaking that took nearly 10 years’ work and was finally completed during lockdown. “I used a lot of antique fabrics because I have been collecting antique laces, jewellery, braid and old fabrics – I still make things for the family and myself,” she says. “It was a challenge.”

8th Panel. Haggard Queen: Abby holding a goblet wears blue chiffon dress with asymmetric hem edged with silver lace and Swarovski crystal. Blue lace crepe de chin silk shawl edged with silver lace. Vamp Queen: Maria wears blue and black spot wool crepe dress with feather boas. Lavish Queen: Thalia wears white and black antique lace fitted top over silk satin taffeta skirt with appliqued white lace motifs and a white lace antique shawl. Photograph: Barry McCall

The tableaux photographed here by Barry McCall in Robins’s garden are of groups of queens who include Etain, Helen, Maeve, Fand and Deirdre and, in another coincidence, among the models is Aine O’Gorman, the great granddaughter of Harry Clarke. It is not often that a fashion designer responds to an artist who in turn has responded to a poem, which makes Robins’s project unique and valuable and its layering – black lace over gold silk, black tulle over bright pink and the glorious shawls and headdresses – might have been appreciated by Clarke himself.

Though the clothes were not designed for sale, anybody wishing to purchase, can email Glynis Robins at glynisrobins@gmail.com.

Additional fine vintage jewellery supplied by Elva Robins at www.collected.ie

Some of the lace wraps can be found in Billie & Oso at 205 Harold’s Cross Road, Harold’s Cross, Dublin 8.

Magazine