Rowena Foong
Rowena Foong is one of three creative sisters behind High Tea with Mrs Woo – a design collaboration that champions sustainable ways to craft and wear clothing.
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When you’re looking for slow fashion and Australian-made, you’ll undoubtedly discover the work of High Tea with Mrs Woo. Established in 2004, it is the design collaboration of three creative sisters championing sustainable ways to craft and wear clothing. Rowena Foong and her sisters, and Angela, create enduring designs in natural fibre fabrics to enjoy long and useful lives.
The sisters engage in clothing ethics and circular design practices with initiatives such as facilitating sustainable the change to biodegradable uniforms for local schools and Mrs Woo Lifecycle Market-place for buying and selling preloved garments. An average of 100 Mrs Woo garments are being re-homed every year through this initiative.
Rowena and her sisters also developed Kintsugi for Clothing – a philosophical mending practice to cherish and extend the life of clothes by repairing with gold threads. It is defined by straightforward repair and the practice of restraint. The gold threads are not used to embellish but to do the effective and symbolic work of darning and honouring a broken moment. The fault is not relinquished but highlighted, the memory valued.
AWARDS
Finalists – 2023 MAKE Award (Australian Design Centre NSW)
Finalists – 2020 We the Makers Design Awards (National Wool Museum VIC)