Emma Gilles, owner of the Craft Workshop in Wellington Place in Belfast, is a one-woman whirlwind of creative activity. If she’s not giving someone a stylish new haircut, she’s designing one-off garments, or hosting a mad hatter’s tea party. Craft Workshop itself is one of Belfast most thrillingly bizarre shops, jam-packed with craft and curios, from tea-cosies and fine china to Chopper bikes and antique prams.
Now Gilles is offering a new service: customised tailoring. The workshop is housed in the same building as that venerable Belfast institution, Parsons and Parsons tailors, and one day, while rummaging in the attic of the Victorian property, Gilles was excited to discover a cache of gentlemen’s suits from the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s. Having received permission to sell them, Gilles will cut, craft and customise the suits according to her customers’ wishes. “We combine pure tailoring and craftsmanship with off-the-wall fashion ideas,” says Gilles. After getting measured up, customers – both men and women – can select the “chic and cheap” service, with the addition of buttons and beads, funky stitching or extra pockets, or they can go for the luxury version, accessorising their re-styled suit with precious stones, vintage trinkets and Swarovski crystals.
And if all that gives people a taste for even more customised design, they can bring in an old table or chair and Gilles will give it a new lease of life with one of her idiosyncratic “crafty treatments”. See craft-workshop.com.
