Mother of fashion: Dame Pieter Stewart
Dame Pieter Stewart founded New Zealand Fashion Week in 2001 – an event that would revolutionise the local industry and become a creative benchmark. She tells Metropol editor Nina Tucker of its evolution and the satisfaction that comes from watching what she built succeed without her.
These days, Dame Pieter Stewart spends less time waking up at 6.30am to produce the fashion industry’s biggest annual event and more time with one of five grandchildren. “It’s such a luxury to be able to sit back and enjoy the result of what others have produced,” she says on the undertaking that is New Zealand Fashion Week (NZFW).
She sold the company to businessman Feroz Ali in 2021, who, with a team of industry creatives and sponsors, has developed this year’s ‘new look’ event grounded in local design and commercial success. “Sponsorship funding is always a huge part of getting fashion week together, and the needs of those partners and designers drives the direction,” Dame Pieter explains.
While her only link to it now is as its founder, it’s impossible to shake the emotional investment in a brand she spent 20 years building. Nurturing it into a brand so beloved it could withstand a volatile economy and shifting landscape, Dame Pieter finds satisfaction knowing the rules will forever be rewritten to suit the times.
Producing NZFW in the early days was “so foreign to what people are dealing with now”, she says. The digital age changed everything: “The way we shot stills, video, staged promotion and publicised the event.” It once meant shooting on film before students spent their school holidays clipping and curating scrapbooks full of imagery. Now, designers and events teams have to pivot fast in an overly-saturated online world. That evolution was always inevitable – luckily Dame Pieter had the resilience in her toolkit to tackle it.
Coordinating one of the busiest events on the nation’s calendar generates a lot of publicity – with each innovative transformation comes an exchange of public opinion. “As its owner I was in the firing line. You just have to focus, know your own truth, be circumspect with who you get advice from, and keep on keeping on,” she reflects. “Unfortunately triumphs often don’t get the weight they deserve and the traumas take up far too much of our brain space.”
It helped that work was a family affair.
“For many years I had all my daughters working on the event – Myken as sponsorship manager, Kristen managing makeup teams, Anneke as backstage photographer and Soren assisting production teams. That support and involvement was wonderful and very special.”
To make the guest list in the defining years, you would have to be a designer, delegate or sponsor. Now, the general public gets buy-in. It was Myken who saw an opportunity in the industry and consumer experience, reshaping the event from a trade show to Fashion Weekend in 2005. “The designers that showed there were more commercial and shows were sold to the public, creating a different excitement and vibe from the industry-focused Fashion Week,” Dame Pieter recalls.
The event was the seed for a community that had never had the opportunity to bloom. “It brings together fashion, music, hair and makeup teams, PR, production teams, and commerce – a whole industry that did not exist before NZFW,” she says. “It has launched countless careers and brands, and fashion designers have become household names. There was nothing more satisfying for me than a designer than to get international orders from the many buyers and press we brought to the event each year.”
Dame Pieter relinquished the routine of weaving countless shows into a careful schedule and liaising with industry professionals three years ago and is still adjusting to the freedom. “Having more flexibility is a treat and being able to go places without the ties of full-time business is quite foreign to me.” She’s making light work of it, soaking up every extra moment with those close to her. “Family is my happy spot – the grandchildren are growing up so fast that I just want every minute I can with them.”
Leftover time is shared between Christchurch and Auckland across post-NZFW opportunities that felt right and her return to the boards of multiple health and education organisations – something she sacrificed when fashion week commitments proved too large. “Life seems very busy still,” she laughs. With more travel and good health on her horizon, Dame Pieter’s new version of ‘busy’ has become a luxury well-earned.
DAME PIETER’S FAVOURITES
Favourite NZFW show of all time? Sorry – I can’t pick! To me each and every one was special.
The most iconic New Zealand designer? There are a number – Karen Walker, Zambesi, Kate Sylvester, World, Trelise Cooper, Rosaria Hall, Hailwood, and many others that will survive the test of time.
One piece of clothing you can’t live without? I have some pieces I will never discard from Rosaria Hall.
The person you look up to most? My father and my father-in-law – even though they left us many years ago, when faced with a situation, I think – how would one of them handle it – what would they say?
Your favourite book and movie? In the last couple of years Abraham Verghese’s The Covenant of Water has stood out, and nothing yet has surpassed Casablanca.
Most special memory? Early years on holiday with my family in the Marlborough Sounds, where we still holiday with our own family.
The best way to spend your spare time? I love to read and listen to music. We go walking regularly and I try to do Pilates on my reformer most days.
