Eight years after she set up in business as a designer, Dubliner Daryl Kerrigan's clothes will finally be available in her native city from this autumn. Her success in the US - home since 1986 - has been phenomenal and that makes the absence of the Daryl K label here in Ireland all the more startling.
Two years ago, she received the Perry Ellis Award for Young Designer of the Year from the Council of Fashion Designers in the US but even this accolade appeared to have little impact back in Dublin. Kerrigan is a perfect instance of the prophet being without honour in her own country. Not that she seems in any way troubled by such neglect. In fact Kerrigan is entirely sanguine about her career and its development, preferring to talk of her year-old son Finn. This laid-back approach to fashion is apparent in the clothes she creates, helping to explain their popularity in the US where they provide a refreshing alternative to the disciplined dressing more usually promoted.
Kerrigan moved into the fashion business, if not reluctantly then certainly without a strategy or a carefully mapped-out plan. Moving to the US after graduating from the National College of Art and Design, she had to work as a waitress before an opportunity arose in film costume design. However, the pleasure of this quickly palled - "in the movie business you can't be that creative," she says - and so in June 1991, she opened a shop on Manhattan's East 6th Street selling her own clothes.
For the first couple of years, Kerrigan and her boyfriend/business partner Paul Leonard discovered just how much and how fast they had to learn about running a clothing company in New York, the centre of the American rag trade. However, what immediately caught the attention of customers was a raw, street-wise energy in her designs which was totally different from the sleekly marketed but rather colourless work of most US fashion houses.
The youthful zestiness of the early clothes remains in her more recent work, although it is no longer produced on a machine behind the shop. A characteristic of Daryl K items, both in the eponymous main line and the secondary K-189 range, is the designer's understanding of her clientele's needs. Devotees tend to be young and very aware of fashion trends. Kerrigan was among the first designers, for example, to produce the now ubiquitous bootleg hipster trouser and she also chose from the start to stage her fashion shows in warehouses rather than more formal settings. Many of her biggest fans are in Japan, a country which has more percipience in relation to fashion than almost any other. Kerrigan's first wholesale customer was Japanese and until now Japan has been the greatest importer of her clothes. Inevitably, as demand for the work has grown - Daryl K designs are now stocked by department stores in every major US city and she has two outlets of her own in New York - its character has changed.
"I think the clothes are getting more sophisticated," she says, "but I don't believe they're losing any of their original spirit." One advantage of success has been the opportunity to deploy better manufacturing methods; instead of running up pieces herself, she now has much of the work produced in Italy. "That's the payoff for getting to a higher level. The way things are made is really refined." And the designs themselves are more complex. Typical of next season's range is a black wool skirt with tabard front and back held by four buckles on either side. "People are ready to buy unusual pieces, whereas they used to want simple things," she explains. Among the more unusual: a "chill chaser" quilted jacket made from a steel-fibred nylon originally made for lining space craft and a pair of reversible jeans made from a modified version of tailor's interfacing with wool felt backing.
Then there are dresses and tops in an olive green, double-face jersey which can be adapted to meet the wearer's requirements as everything, even the sleeves, are capable of alteration. A winter white skirt has a net pouch on the front and a scallop hem of broderie anglaise, a chunky cable-knit sweater has removable sleeves held by nappy pins, a pair of pants comes with side buckles and a flap front which can be worn up or down. Despite the variety of pieces - from a "Victorian" motorcycle jacket with three-quarter length sleeves to a pair of black wool trousers with attached knee-length baggy overshorts - there is consistency of inspiration running through the entire collection.
Kerrigan says the line contains "all the things you don't have but really, really want. I think I'm probably making things now that are a lot more essential and I guess there's a more conscious feeling of styling. In this collection, everything's an essential piece and we've proved that by nothing being dropped from the line; it has all been extremely successful from start to finish." In addition to coming to Ireland for the first time, Kerrigan is also about to start offering her clothes over the Internet. "I think it's going to open up a huge new area of business," says the designer. "So many people live in small towns and like to wear unusual clothes but have nowhere to buy them." So, even if her Irish fans cannot come to Dublin, they will still, at last, be able to build up their own Daryl K collection.
From this week, Daryl Kerrigan's K-189 range will be available at Cuba, Trinity Street, Dublin; the shop will also be stock- ing the Daryl K collection from next month.
