Whetu Tirikatene-Sullivan’s Style – Lizzie Wratislav and Tryphena Cracknell

Jim Watt: Welcome to the Duart Historical Society meeting today. We’re privileged to have folk from the museum in Napier here; Lizzie Wratislav will be the principal speaker. She is curator of the Design Collection, and later in the meeting we may be joined by Tryphena Cracknell who’s the Kaitiaki Taonga Maori for the museum – we hope that she’ll join us later.

The topic this morning is ‘Inside the Wardrobe of the Honourable Whetu Tirikatene-Sullivan’. You’ll all remember Mrs Tirikatene-Sullivan as being the MP [Member of Parliament] for some years for this particular area, and of course, her father was famous in that regard too, in earlier times. I once sat beside Whetu Tirikatene-Sullivan on the aeroplane coming back from Wellington, so I know all about her. [Laughter] Lizzie, thank you for coming today, and we look forward to hearing what you have to tell us.

Lizzie Wratislav: Thank you. Now, from the moment she swept into Parliament in 1967, Whetu Tirikatene-Sullivan captured New Zealand’s hearts and minds, not least for her bold sense of style. Whether in her office or on the marae, the young Maori politician turned heads with … [microphone interference, deleted] … emblazoned with contemporary kowhaiwhai patterns. This fusion of fashion and politics united two of Whetu’s passions, marking the beginning of a journey that would see her become New Zealand’s longest serving female Member of Parliament, and our very own fashion icon.

Now as many of you will be aware, the Hawke’s Bay Museums Trust was recently gifted an important collection of garments from the wardrobe of the late Honourable Whetu Tirikatene-Sullivan. This nationally significant collection was gifted to us by the Tirikatene-Sullivan family, and will be celebrated in the MTG [Museum Theatre Gallery] Hawke’s Bay’s upcoming exhibition, ‘Whetu Tirikatene-Sullivan – Travel in Style’, which opens on the 27th September [2014]. Given Whetu’s national profile, many ask the question as to why Hawke’s Bay? You mentioned earlier that she was Member of Parliament for this region, so that’s one of the reasons of course, but I thought I’d just begin by unfolding some of those other connections, and how we became entrusted with the care and display of this wonderful collection of garments.

The Museum’s relationship with Whetu and her family goes back more than a decade now. It was in 2001 that my colleague[s], Lucy Hammonds and Douglas Lloyd-Jenkins, took a research paper on Whetu’s clothing to the Courtauld Institute in London. It was a paper that explored how Maori motifs had appeared in New Zealand fashion over time, and Whetu’s own story sort of took a quite a central place in that in history. Whetu later had been highly supportive of Douglas and Lucy when they were doing their research for their book, ‘The Dress Circle’, and again, Whetu’s story found quite an obvious home in that anthology of New Zealand fashion. And it was really through this relationship that Whetu had come to believe that the Hawke’s Bay Museum Trust’s collection would be a fitting home for her surviving gowns.

Of course Whetu died in 2011, and after that her family were keen to fulfil that wish. And then in 2013, which is where I come into the picture really, the donation to the Museum was formalised, and plans for an exhibition of those garments got under way. I went on a trip down to Wellington to meet Whetu’s husband, Denis Sullivan, and her daughter, May-Ana, who live in Ngaio. It was the first time I met them [and] saw the garments, and from there we brought a selection of those back for the Museum collection.

[Showing slides]

But the collection at Hawke’s Bay does not stop there; Whetu’s love of fashion reached back to her Hawke’s Bay whanau. In her early years she was raised by her maternal grandmother, Amiria Henrici Solomon, a talented dress designer and tailor from the settlement of Mohaka in northern Hawke’s Bay. Taught by her grandmother, Whetu learned to design, knit and sew her own clothes. By her early teens, she was already incorporating Maori motifs into garments, and she continued to make most of her own clothes right up until her entry to Parliament and beyond.

It was on the 11th March 1967 that Whetu won the Southern Maori by-election and became the youngest woman ever elected to New Zealand Parliament; following in the footsteps of her late father, Sir Eruera Tirikatene, she was to serve the vast Southern Maori electorate. At the time, Southern Maori was the largest electorate in New Zealand and the Commonwealth, and it stretched from Stewart Island, all the way up the east coast of the North Island as far as Gisborne, so that included Hawke’s Bay. And in this image we see a young, confident female Maori politician standing on Waimarama beach in her Southern Maori electorate. Her dress too, as I’ll explain, is another link to Hawke’s Bay. Soon after that by-election Whetu was visiting constituents at Raupunga Memorial Hall in Northern Hawke’s Bay, where she was struck by the unique curtains that featured in the hall. The bold and contemporary textile design was the work of Hawke’s Bay artist, Sandy Adsett.

1967 was also the year of the controversial Maori Affairs Amendment Act, and Whetu hit the ground running, with strong opposition to a number of the clauses in the Act. In recognition of her advocacy for Maori, Sandy Adsett sent her a parcel containing three yards of printed white linen fabric. The design featured a prominent mangopare, or hammerhead shark, pattern, a motif that Adsett saw as a reflection of Whetu’s strength and fighting stance. Whetu said, “It was a spectacular piece, bold and definite in its black, stylised Maori motif, and the most exciting thing that happened to me that year.” [Chuckle] That was for her a pretty important moment. Adsett had suggested in a note to her that it might have been suitable for curtains or cushions. But Whetu, being the young and fashionable woman she was, transformed the fabric into this striking shift dress, which you see her wearing in this photo.

For Whetu, the discovery of that fabric in Raupunga, sparked her renewed interest in applying Maori motif[s] to clothing, and would be the beginning of an ongoing collaboration with Sandy Adsett. The dress she made was a visionary act, demonstrating her understanding of the power of fashion to convey a contemporary Maori position.

Now in a sea of grey suits, Whetu turned heads with her long, elegant gowns decorated with those contemporary kowhaiwhai motifs. This is one of my favourite images [which] I’ve come across from the Alexander Turnbull Library collection, and I feel it very much illustrates just how much she stood out in the crowd. Whetu is wearing another of the garments in the collection, a soft gold silk [cough] dress decorated again in the Sandy Adsett kowhaiwhai. She has a delicate black net placed jauntily over her hairdo, open sandals and matching handbag – a complete and perfectly calculated outfit.

This of course is an image dating from 1972 when Norman Kirk’s Labour Party won the election; this is the Kirk Cabinet, which for the first time included two Maori, including Whetu, who became New Zealand’s first ever female Maori Cabinet Minister.

Whetu’s choice of clothing was always well considered; she understood the power of fashion as I said, correctly judging that clothing can provide a common ground upon which important messages could be delivered. While the garments themselves are simple in design and construction, the patterns range from bold and assertive through to subtle, nuanced, and that sort of created a visual language that she drew upon, with a lot of insight really, judging different events; choosing different outfits.

See here – this is an image where she’s down full front in the crowd meeting their idol of the 1975 Land March on Parliament grounds. This is a rather bold design by Maori designer, Kura Ensor; it’s a one shouldered dress, and even more striking in colour, because that kowhaiwhai pattern is in black, red and white.

She chose more delicate and abstract arrangements for other situations; here she is at the International Women’s Year Conference in Mexico, also in 1975. She wears one of her floating silk gowns, delicately handblocked with Maori motifs by one of her favourite designers, Christchurch-based Fanny Buss. Here she projects an image of confidence and femininity. Now her floating silk gown was one of Whetu’s iconic designs, made of a lightweight silk. The whole garment could be rolled up in a handbag and pulled out for a very glamourous appearance at an important event. Her wardrobe very much suited her busy lifestyle, and as MP for Southern Maori as well as Minister of Tourism, Whetu travelled extensively throughout New Zealand and internationally. This was a huge commitment, requiring between eighty and a hundred and twenty hours of work and at least eight hundred kilometres of travel each week. Despite the considerable effort, Whetu always emerged at the end of a journey impeccably turned out in her signature style. This is her again, in another version of the floating silk gown with her husband, Denis Sullivan.

Whetu’s wardrobe was also one of a working mother; bold patterns cleverly disguised spills and sticky fingers. Whetu found her skills in design and dressmaking particularly useful throughout her three pregnancies, her signature loose fitting kaftans offering perfect maternity wear, concealing any obvious changes. So this was taken in 1973, and Whetu at the time was pregnant with her son, Tiri, who was born in ‘74. But it was in 1970 that Whetu became the first pregnant MP to ever walk in the halls of Parliament, and she always felt that her clothing helped to gently introduce that idea to the majority of men that surrounded her. When carrying her first child May-Ana, Whetu worked tirelessly, missing just six days of Parliament when the baby arrived. She was always determined to balance her career and family, and Whetu created space for her new baby in her parliamentary office and continued to work alongside her. That’s her there, baby May-Ana in the carrycot in Whetu’s office.

As her family grew, Whetu very much continued that important emphasis on her family, her children and husband often appearing at her side, travelling with her, and unsurprisingly they were very often all, or some of them, kitted out in their own striking Maori motif fashions. So that’s May-Ana there wearing her poncho made by Kowhai Knitwear, who also made this [sneeze] vest that’s in the collection. May-Ana’s poncho has a smaller version of that same taniko pattern on her poncho. Denis too – Whetu had a lot of garments made for Denis, also by Kowhai Knitwear, a Wellington-based company. And yeah – lots of wonderful photos of the whole family kitted out.

As Whetu’s persona grew in the public eye, so too did her interest in fashion, and her desire to promote the use of Maori motifs on fabric. And while she enjoyed creating fashion designs herself, often taking a sketch pad to pass time while waiting in airports or on flights, Whetu was aware that there was a community of artists and designers whose talents and philosophies could have a wider reach. Putting herself into the role as a patron and advocate for Maori design, Whetu realised she could provide important support, both to those making Maori fashion and those wishing to wear it. And with a bit of encouragement from her husband, Denis, Whetu developed her personal interest in fashion and her own skills into an idea for a small boutique which she called Ethnic Art Studio. That’s the label from one of the garments in the collection which carried that label [coughing] in her shop. There were two different labels that she produced; this one is the international range which she was trying to target at a more international market.

But in the years leading up to the opening of Ethnic Art Studio on 18th December 1972, Whetu spent whatever spare time she had, usually one hour in every twelve, gathering ideas and researching handcrafts from [cough] around the world. “I love researching”, she said to a New Zealand Women’s Weekly reporter, “to see the variety of hand-woven fabrics from the sheerest pure silk to exclusive New Zealand hand-woven tweed and the burst of colour in the various ethnic prints”. Whetu had much enthusiasm for this new project, stating she felt revitalised by her creative endeavours.

As she travelled she took the opportunity to meet with various fabric printers, spinners and knitters who supplied Ethnic Art Studio. I mentioned before one of her favourite designers, Fanny Buss, who is based down in Christchurch; Fanny is no longer with us, but her daughter, Lee Trusttum, is a wonderful source of information, and she very much remembers Whetu as being quite an exciting customer in her visits to their studio in Christchurch.

You know, Whetu may have selected garments when she was on her trips around the country, but mostly, you know, her selected handcrafters were sending up products to her to her shop in Wellington. And Ethnic Art Studio was situated in Perrett’s Corner, which if you know Wellington, is on the corner of Willis and Manners Street[s]. It was at the time just opened as quite the trendy new shopping complex, and she said that her boutique set out to provide host and hostess leisure wear using ethnic handprints including traditional Maori design. They were all unique and made with the highest quality fabrics, and found a particular market with the executive wife in need of something when travelling abroad that would readily identify her with New Zealand. So that I suppose, is that market that she was trying to target with this international label, to start putting New Zealand and New Zealand design on the world stage.

Whetu’s role in Ethnic Art Studio was mostly one of patronage, and as the coordinator of talent for others. However, she did continue to contribute some of her own designs for sale through the boutique. Her designs usually combined glamour and practicality; simple shapes made bold through intermittent patterns and fabrics. This is one of her signature bags that she designed – you just can see on my other side, they come in a whole range of colours. They’re made of a very simple canvas … lightweight, affordable, easy to produce. Whetu’s whole idea with them is that they’re a perfect A4 size, so they can fit all her documents quite nicely inside, and the idea with the handle was that it would just sit over her forearm leaving her hand sort of free for delivering speeches, or greeting constituents, or whatever it may be. So that she has in all sorts of different colours, different fabrics, one to go with every outfit. [Chuckles] And for the pattern on the bags, which appears on both sides, she worked with Sandy Adsett again to come up with that pattern.

Heavy work commitments and family life caused Whetu to relinquish Ethnic Art Studio to the care of her shop manager. It had quite a short life span – closed around 1975 – but Whetu did continue to design and have garments made for herself and her family. Design and dressmaking was very much a lifelong passion, with those early skills she inherited from her grandmother combined with her own innate sense of style, Whetu was to leave a unique mark on the history of New Zealand fashion. Through her own designs and the patronage of some of the most radical artists and designers of the time, Whetu made it clear she understood the power of fashion.

Labour lost the election in 1975, and so Whetu, while she never really returned to the limelight of the Cabinet bench, did keep dressing in this way, using her fashion very much as a means of projecting her personality, her culture and her political roles.

This is the graphic for the exhibition coming up. Now the exhibition very much focuses on that same period that I was talking about, so from 1967 when she was first elected through to 1975 when Labour lost that election. That’s the period we see as, you know, very much being the peak of her public profile, and it was the period where her own creative endeavours and her design was at its peak as well, and so the garments from the collection date from that period.

I’ve only shown you, of course, a very small selection of garments, ‘cause I didn’t want to give it all away, [chuckles] but there are twenty-six garments that came in in the collection, and we have also borrowed a number of other items – several dresses plus some jewellery, the bags which are being held onto by the family for now, ‘cause Whetu’s daughter, May-Ana, often enjoys wearing her mother’s designs, so she’s holding off ‘til the last minute.

Are there any questions?

Question: What did she wear in winter? [Laughter]

Lizzie: Her wardrobe was trans-seasonal. You often see her layering, sort of black polo necks underneath the gowns. I think you saw that in the Land March photo … she’s wearing that you know, one-shoulder gown that she had a sort of black skivvy underneath. A lot of the gowns as well, they’ve got a long split up the side, so they’re actually worn with trousers, and more like a long tunic. I mean, that was part of her … she had a very practical approach to fashion that sort of very much comes through. And one of those things she liked was … yeah, she liked that ability to be able to layer the fashions. And they were all very loose-fitting garments so she was easily able to do that.

Question: So she’s had three children, the oldest one is May-Ana … [what] are the other two?

Lizzie: Well she lost one of her children … so she had two children; May-Ana, who’s been very much involved with the museum and the English development; and Tiri, who is a pilot based in Hong Kong. Yeah, he’s all over the place. [Chuckles]

Question: Her husband, is he still alive?

Lizzie: Yes – Denis has also been very involved with the Museum and in this whole process.

Question: So they’ll be at the opening I presume?

Lizzie: Yes, they will. Denis is a physicist; he works at Victoria University as a lecturer there, in Astrophysics.

Question: I was going to ask – you said that Sandy Adsett gave her the parcel of stuff to make curtains out of … did they actually use Maori motif in the interior décor in their house?

Lizzie: Yes. I haven’t really seen too many images of the interior of their house from that period, but it was present in some ways; not always in textile form, but … I suppose Whetu had so many contacts with contemporary Māori artists that there’s a lot of contemporary Maori art in her home. Whetu’s sort of interest in ethnic print and pattern and Maori design did come into her work as Minister of Tourism as well. And Whetu did a lot of work researching and trying to promote the use of Maori handcrafts in hotels as Minister of Tourism. She did a lot of work pushing for that. I know she went on a research trip in ‘73 to [cough] Fiji. There’s all these wonderful photos of her at the market, looking at textiles, and you know, sourcing ideas to bring back to do sort of Pacific themed hotel decors.

Yes, [??] …very much promoting high quality Maori handcrafts.

Comment: I think I’ve got a knitting pattern at home …

Lizzie: Yeah. There is quite a popular – I think it came out as a magazine supplement – an entire book devoted to Maori knitting patterns. And some of the knitwear that I showed by Janet Hopper of Kowhai Knitwear [microphone interference] drew from the patterns that appeared in the books that everyone access to.

Question: On that label that you showed for the International Ethnic Art … what was the word at the top?

Lizzie: Individuality, from Ethnic Art.

Reply: Individuality by …

Lizzie: By … yeah. [Chuckle] So I suppose that was you know, highlighting the fact that these were all unique, one-off garments.

Question: So the actual designs and shapes on the garments, did they have meaning?

Lizzie: You mean the actual patterns applied to the textiles? Well, they do. I mean I spoke about the hammerhead shark, the mangopare pattern. And that reoccurs in a lot of the patterns that Sandy Adsett provided, so they often do connect to Maori stories.

Rose Mohi: If there’s no other questions, it’s my duty to say thank you to you, but I’d just like to add a little bit about Aunty Whetu … she was Aunty Whetu in our family, we knew her well. She was the most dynamic, exciting woman. She would sleep two or three hours a night, not much more. And if you went to see her, as I did several times, she’d often be having to have a sleep because she had to get ready to talk with me and things, but she was exciting. We asked about what was in the house; I remember the cushions had kowhaiwhai pattern, and the carpet …

Lizzie: Ah, carpet.

Rose: There was a carpet; but I didn’t go until the seventies – I wasn’t here. And not long before she died, because you mentioned the Maori Purposes Act, she came with our family when we were petitioning Parliament; got out of a sick bed to help us present our petition to Parliament. She was dead not long afterwards. So she was very much a part of our family, and it’s lovely to hear more of her, and you’ve got it all off pat there … [Chuckles]

Now I’ve just seen Tryphena walk in the back – and Tryphena, I’ll start you off – I’ll introduce Tryphena, who I’ve worked closely with over the last few years – there was a question regarding the patterns within Aunty Whetu’s dresses, the kowhaiwhai; question about the meaning of …

Tryphena: Kia ora koutou. Sorry to pop in at the last minute, but nice to be here.

Yes … yes they do. A lot of them are like Maori traditional patterns but they’re slightly different, so they could be referencing different things. These ones here, the triangle shape is often the patiki, or flounder, and the little triangles are often used for a pattern called Nihoniho Taniwha which is a tukutuku pattern, so connecting to those traditional things. And so it was really new for her to take those patterns from the marae, from the traditional wharenui, and to be wearing them in her clothes. It was the first time it had ever been done, or they’d come out from the marae.

Lizzie: Just with this one … Whetu had a taniko headband, and she took that to Janice Hopper of Kowhai Knitwear and said, “Can you turn it this into, you know, something contemporary?” And that’s that pattern.

Question: Was there any suggestion that it was slightly sacrilege to do that?

Tryphena: I think because of who she was and the mana that she had, she was able to do it. I don’t know of anyone speaking publicly about that in here? I think people were quite taken back that she would so boldly wear the patterns. But you know, there are some young, contemporary designers working in this way now, so – there’s one called Adrienne Whitewood who’s in Rotorua. She has a taniko print that’s on the front of a silk dress, so it’s still happening a little bit.

Rose: But they change the pattern a little bit so it’s their pattern. You never use anyone else’s pattern; you don’t take anyone else’s design. You give it an alteration and make it yours.

Tryphena: And that’s something – you’ve probably looked at Sandy Adsett’s pattern … have you had a look at some of the dresses? I mean that mangopare pattern is really quite commonly seen around the Island in rafters, but he’s just made it quite different from any of those – he’s made it his own. And that particular pattern in Hawke’s Bay also relates to the story of Pania and Moremore which is the hammerhead shark; Pania of the Reef and her son, Moremore, who takes the form of a shark or a stingray, and sometimes an octopus. And so for Sandy, that probably had quite a strong connection to Hawke’s Bay as well

Question: That initial design that came from Raupunga and started it off – What did that ..?

Tryphena: Well, that is … so similar to that, but he’s just changed it a little bit so that it is his, just as Rose was saying. Have you mentioned about his new pattern?

Lizzie: Oh no, I haven’t.

Tryphena: Oh, good. [Chuckle] He’s actually worked with us to develop another pattern that’s also based on this; but again, slightly different, which we’re going to have printed onto silk scarves, so we’re very excited about having those available in the shop. [Chuckles]

Question: Do you have copyright on the patterns?

Tryphena: On his patterns?

Reply: Or on any patterns, really …

Tryphena: Interestingly, he has given the copyright for that mangopare pattern he’s done for us to the family, to May-Ana and Denis and Tiri. It’s a funny thing; for Māori the copyright … in some ways it’s considered a great honour if someone … say you composed a waiata, and then everybody starts singing it … then it’s a really big honour.

Tryphena, could I ask you, how appropriate is it for a Pakeha to wear … a lady wearing a silk scarf with a Maori motif – is that a compliment?

Tryphena: Interestingly, some of Whetu’s patterns were actually designed by Pakeha artists, so she was quite open to working with contemporary Pakeha designers and artists as well. So Taylor [?] was one of those, and recently we found out that Donn Salt did one of her pounamu necklaces. So personally, I think it’s appropriate. I always say to people who ask me about wearing pounamu for example … wearing the Maori design, then it’s about who they are and how they identify themselves. So certainly I would think that a Pakeha woman, for example, could wear one of Sandy’s scarves. He’s gifted that pattern for everyone to be able to wear. But also I think for people in Hawke’s Bay, it might be something that would be very special to wear, because it says that you’re from Hawke’s Bay and it’s yours.

Question: D’you have souvenir shops in Rotorua say, selling items to ..?

Tryphena: That’s right. Well, you know, as much as we can criticise that souvenir thing, all the Rotorua people, and actually nationally, the formation of those shops and all of that culture that kind of went with it actually saved a lot of their waiata and their traditional carving patterns. So at a time when a lot of Maori were moving away from that or were being pushed away from traditional Maori things, that actually preserved it. So all that kapa haka performance meant all their people were speaking Maori, learning songs and just keeping the culture going.

Comment: Because they had an income from it, you know …

Tryphena: That’s right, yeah. Yeah. It’s huge. And actually there’s been an exhibition recently that’s come out of Te Puia, which is Matatoki; looking at some of those carvers that came through that carving school – contemporary ones.

Tryphena, you may like to stick around for a few minutes, ‘cause people might like to have a chat with you afterwards, if that’s all right?

Tryphena: Yeah, yeah.

[Applause]