WHEN Mary Gregory got her communion money, she knew immediately what to do with it: "I went out and bought some blue fabric and I cut it and I made a dress." Although she started making her own clothes at the age of six and went to the Graft on Academy of Dress Designing a mere 10 years later, the suggestion that she always knew she was going to be a designer surprises her.
This contradiction is summed up by the fact that most of the women sipping tea at the other tables in the Shelbourne have already spotted her dress and, probably, identified it as a distinctive Mary Gregory design, without realising that the short, diffident 34 year old who is wearing it actually is Mary Gregory.
She does not have the pouting supermodel glamour most people (this reporter among them) associate with the fashion business. She looks like a grown up version of the girl next door, with floppy blonde hair and not a trace of make up. She has a wrinkle in her forehead that suggests her thoughts are still with her two little boys (she is late for the interview because she couldn't resist seeing them off to school).
When she is designing, as she is now, she normally just wears jeans. But for my sake, she has put on this dress from her current collection. It is full length, made of heavy white jersey with long, feminine chiffon sleeves. The smoky blue hand painted swirls which wander across her chest and arms match the blue of her eyes. Her jacket is also blue and is made of what looks like embossed paper.
The dress is soft and clingy but not closefitting. It looks, invitingly, like a dress in which you could walk across a crowded room without feeling you have to suck in your tummy.
She drinks copious cups of Earl Grey tea and talks a mile a minute - she is on an adrenalin rush because she's in the middle of designing her Mary Gregory collection for next autumn/winter and her head is full of colours and shapes.
She pauses to make a quick phone call to her husband and business partner Aidan McCarthy, just to make sure a garment is being cut the way she wants it, then explains: "I normally work through the night when I'm designing. It's the only time I get some quiet so I just accept it. During the day I'm interrupted all the time to look at patterns and samples.
"I don't mind really because it is only for three or four weeks at a time and then we go on a holiday. You're only talking about 12 weeks of the year when I am working day and night."
It was in February of last year, when Mary's spring/summer collection was presented at the Point's supermodel show, that her work reached a wide audience. Suddenly everyone wanted to buy her designs: "Although we had been making steady progress over the years, it wasn't until that show we became really visible. We had 40 phonecalls from people all over the world who wanted to buy the collection. We were approached by Deirdre Kelly of A Wear to design the Gregory collection twice a year exclusively for A Wear in Ireland and also for export."
Some shops abroad, notably Liberty ("a fantastic shop to be in"), now want to buy designs from both the Gregory collection and her own Mary Gregory collection. Both collections will be on view for the first time at the prestigious London Designers' Exhibition in September.
"The feedback I'm getting is that our garments are very different from all the other designers' and will sell well because of that," says Gregory.
"We're already selling to Germany, the US, Canada and Japan - but that is only because those buyers have come to Ireland. In London, our clothes will be seen by buyers and media people from all over the world. It is a very high profile event."
She consistently refers to "us" and "our garments": "There is great respect between Aidan and myself. We are both really hard workers but he is like the backbone; he is very supportive.
"I had my first collection in 1984 when the Design Centre opened, two years after I graduated from the Graft on Academy. I met Aidan when I was doing my second collection. He was involved in the manufacturing end of the fashion business. It was John Rocha who introduced us.
"Aidan says he knew instantly, when he shook my hand, that this was the person he was going to spend the rest of his life with. It's funny because he is not normally a very romantic sort of person. He got quite a shock." The two began to work together and their relationship blossomed.
"I design and do the patterns and he completes the patterns, cuts the samples and sees everything through to the end with the machinists. I tell him how I want it to look and he carries it out." She is looking forward to September when "all of the production will be overseen in a separate factory by me and Aidan".
Twice a year they go off to Paris to look at fabrics. That's where she found the paper fabric for her jacket. Yes - it is made of paper: "It is paper but you can wash it and it is really warm. It comes from Italy and it rustles when you move." It features in many of her spring/summer Mary Gregory designs, in either plain or stretchy versions. There are paper jackets, skirts and trousers in blue, white and pink: she dislikes harsh colours.
Her head is currently full of different tones of mulberry, brown, heavy cream and bronze, as she is designing clothes for autumn. When it comes to finding the right colour, her inspirations come from different sources: "Most of my colours are inspired by nature. I'm influenced by the sea, by birds, by the sky." She loves going to art galleries and is often inspired by paintings. Walter Osborne and Louis le Brocquy are particular favourites.
She surrounds herself with a medley of different fabric swatches, art books, leaves, stones and pieces of delft before she starts mixing watercolour paints to find the hue she wants: "My eyes are always working and my ideas are developing in my subconscious. Without realising it, I suddenly decide on a colour." If her clothes are going to be hand painted, she spends a week at a time with the painters to ensure the design comes out just right: "I like working slowly - and thoroughly, without rushing. I need to spend at least a few, intense days with the handpainters."
She compares herself to an architect or a painter in that the visual effect is paramount. Simplicity of form is vital, with "a little embellishment". Comfort, although an afterthought, is becoming more important. "Although I don't conceive my designs with a particular body in mind, I don't like clothes to be restrictive," she says. "I know a lot of people buy my clothes to wear at weddings and special occasions, but I design them to be worn as day clothes. I love to see women wearing my dresses with a little haversack on their back, and just enjoying them."
She likes her new arrangement with AWear, as it gives her the opportunity to divide her work into two different categories: "The Gregory collection brings in aspects of the Mary Gregory collection that are simpler, less expensive and more fun. The Mary Gregory clothes are designed to last more than one season, and they are for women all ages, made in more expensive fabrics."
She has just finished designing the Gregory autumn collection, which combines a lacy, layered effect with Celtic imagery and calligraphy with the words of the philosopher, Kahlil Gibran. The Mary Gregory collection, which will involve "cashmeres, angoras and silks", is now bubbling away in her head.
Her fluid, feminine designs have been likened to those of Mariad Whisker by some fashion commentators. She is not happy with the comparison: "Mariad always made very unstructured clothes, whereas in the early days we did a lot of tailored designs. Although I love fluid clothes and we started to develop that, I still think our clothes are more shaped.
"Nicki Creedon, who ran the Design Centre for 10 years and left to set up her own shop, Havana, in Donnybrook, used to stock Mariad's designs and the Mary Gregory collection. After Mariad emigrated to America, Nicki did not feel my designs filled the gap she left. She is now importing clothes from an Italian designer for Mariad's former customers."
Whisker is one of the few Irish designers nary speaks of with admiration as having a pure, true vision". The others are John Rocha and Lainey Keogh: "A lot of other people in Ireland design and make clothes but I wouldn't really call them designers. The few with a real vision, I can instantly recognise their designs and they say the same about mine."
Mary does relate to Whisker in that it took the latter a long time to gain recognition: "She had been working hard and steadily and then she won the Late Late Show Fashion Award and started doing really well. At first, I couldn't understand why she then, at that very time, decided to emigrate to America. Her husband was a graphic designer and was working there for about six months every year, and she wanted to spend more time with him and her family.
"I can understand her better now, having finally made it myself. You work so hard, then success comes, and you realise you have to make decisions. You have to plan things. You have to see where your priorities lie. She was very brave. Her career was just taking off after years of hard work. She realised that she resented all that hard work and really wanted to be with her family. I believe she is just beginning again over there, in a small way."
Mary Gregory is determined never to allow herself to let work take over: "Everybody has to make a choice about what is the most important thing, and for me it is my family. When they are happy, then I work well." When she had her two sons, Joshua (7) and Tobias (5), "I took them to work with me or worked around them every day from the moment they were born." They now go to Castle Park School in Dalkey, where they have after school activities every day until 6 p.m.: "I researched every single school in Dublin and I felt that one was the best. They love it. They are very artistic and they are always drawing and painting. Joshua has started playing the piano and he's fantastic. When they are older, they will go horseback riding."
Mary herself attended Notre Dame primary school in Churchtown. When her parents moved from Dundrum to Athlone, she then went to Our Lady's Bower in Athlone.
Even when she is in the middle of designing, she still goes with Aidan to collect the boys after school: "They knock us back into reality every day. It's a great way to switch off.
"The minute we collect them their needs come first. We take them for a walk in de Vesci park or along the seafront. I go back to work only after the boys are in bed. I might stay up until 1 a.m. and get a few hours sleep, and start again around 5 a.m. well before they wake up."
Holidays are planned to cater for everyone's needs: "Aidan loves flying and gliding. The boys love swimming. Both Aidan and I love going to galleries and looking at architecture. We like peace and simplicity. Finding a holiday that incorporates everything we all like can be hard, because I would never go on a chartered trip." Aesthetic needs are particularly persuasive: "I like buying guidebooks, but I can be very impractical. I'm capable of buying a book about Italy, falling in love with the house on the cover, and then we just have to make our way there, however long it takes."
She is aware of the fact that the world of fashion is perceived as superficial and vain glorious: "I know I am a good designer but sometimes I can't relate to what I do. I want to live a normal life."
THAT wrinkle on her forehead is never far away. She is prone to feelings of guilt, fussing a little because our conversation is so one sided, wondering why she should be doing all the talking.
Her endearing humility leads her to conclude: "At the end of the day, we are only making clothes. We aren't heart surgeons, saving lives. I know everyone has to wear clothes and it is nice if they wear mine, but even so . . . There is no point in sacrificing your life just to make clothes."
