How the Red Dress inspired the Costume for Gloucester

In December 2022 Gloucestershire community artist Jo Teague and costumier Katie Taylor met to discuss an ambitious idea, the creation of a piece of collaboratively stitched clothing to celebrate Gloucester as a centre of folk traditions. Jo had recently completed the Tewkesbury Stitch Story, bringing together 8,000 local participants. Voices Gloucester, a year-round programme championing the city’s history, had asked Jo to ‘bring together the makers of Gloucester’ for a new community art project.

Recent events would factor highly for Jo, a teacher of sewing and needlework at Gloucestershire College and textile historian and researcher for the University of Gloucestershire. ‘Post-COVID people wanted to register their part of something bigger,’ she says. She planned to capture 15-30 contributions and reached out to Katie, a costumier for film, TV and the circus, after seeing her deliver intriguing historical fashion presentations at Gloucester PechaKuchas events. ‘I remember feeling blown away by the scale of the project when Jo first outlined it but equally energised,’ recalls Katie.

Kirstie Macleod and The Red Dress in Glastonbury, 2021 The plan was for Jo to galvanise involvement, with Katie fashioning the backdrop on which contributions would be gathered. Both were already familiar with The Red Dress created by Somerset-based artist Kirstie Macleod and added to by a diverse network of artisans from across the world. Jo had met Kirstie and seen the dress at the Zig Zag Building in Glastonbury in September 2020, part of a series of exhibitions funded by Arts Council England, while Katie had been aware of the project through her Costume Design and Making degree at Nottingham Trent University from which she graduated in 2018.

‘When I first saw The Red Dress, I was in awe of the piece,’ says Jo. ‘I had followed some of its creation on social media and when I first saw it in real life it spoke to me about the way women come together to make. It had strength and a subtlety that drew the viewer in. In one dress it represented so many. It was that concept, of how one item of clothing can embody a community, that became the starting point for the Costume for Gloucester.’

The launch and exhibition of the Costume for Gloucester at Gloucester Cathedral, September 2023. Photo: Jon Teague Including The Red Dress in the planning and inspiration for the Costume for Gloucester in 2023, by which time the completed dress had been contributed to by 380 embroiderers from 51 countries over 14 years, was a meeting of shared visions. In March that year, just a few months after Jo and Katie’s initial conversation, Kirstie and the dress were invited to join a kick-off event for Gloucester’s own collaborative garment, which would be in the style of a coat or cloak, to be held at the Friendship Café.

‘The atmosphere was buzzing all day with textile enthusiasts from all backgrounds joining workshops, buying embroidery supplies, eating delicious Indian food and connecting to some of the stories from The Red Dress project,’ recalls Kirstie. ‘The dress had already prompted community-led responses, the first calico ‘sister dress’, initiated by the Swansea Women’s Asylum and Refugee Support Group at the National Waterfront Museum, and The Community Shawl at The Wool Croft in Abergavenny. It was wonderful to see yet another project take off.’

Detail from the Costume for Gloucester. Photo: Voices Gloucester The Friendship Café, which features a sewing room alongside a community kitchen, would go on to provide a significant number of contributions to the Costume for Gloucester. Like The Red Dress, the garment would quickly increase in scope beyond the early hopes of its originators. ‘It kept expanding and expanding as more people, including those who wouldn’t normally be makers, got involved,’ says Jo. Contributors included Barnwood Park School pupils and attendees of Gloucester Cathedral’s weekly Breakfast Club which supports vulnerable people and those experiencing homelessness.

In total, 134 small, medium and large panels were completed by groups and individuals over six months, with Katie having the challenging task of incorporating them onto a heavyweight mint green base fabric sourced from The Scrapstore at Gloucester’s City Works. ‘I didn’t get them all at the same time; they trickled in,’ she says. ‘It was like a game of Tetris.’ Katie also commissioned local members of the Goldwork Guild to create a larger panel on the back of the Costume for Gloucester in an echo of the striking detail on the bodice of The Red Dress.

Detail from the Costume for Gloucester. Photo: Voices Gloucester Designed in the style of a coat so as to be unisex and pay homage to the elaborate garments historically worn by both men and women, the completed Costume for Gloucester and its ‘patchwork’ of panels was unveiled on Gloucester Day in September 2023. Worn by singer and community leader Tia Callum through the city’s streets before going on display in Gloucester Cathedral, it would go on to be part of the permanent collection at the Museum of Gloucester.

‘The vision was always for it to be visually impactful for parades,’ says Katie. ‘I wanted it to be regal enough to compliment the costumes of town criers and dignitaries as well as drawing on Gloucester’s history and folk traditions. The dress has Tudor elements to it while the accompanying headpiece, which makes the wearer stand tall and upright, is Roman in style.’

The Costume for Gloucester in progress. Photo: Voices Gloucester The exhibition at the Cathedral was the first time many of those involved in the Costume for Gloucester had seen their designs not only on the finished garment but alongside the other panels, recognising the diverse communities which built and continue to shape the city. As well as local popular culture references such as Gloucester Rugby Club, Dick Whittington and the cheese rolling at Cooper’s Hill, the coat bears the needlework of recent migrants and asylum seekers in Gloucester, many supported by the Friendship Café, and those affected by the conflict in Ukraine.

All contributors brought their own stories to relate. Some who were new to embroidery, Katie explains, also conquered self-doubt. The Red Dress, too, has always sought to be a platform for expression and identity, and has increasingly held space for marginalised voices to be heard, leading to its invitation to the session on Equality and Non-Discrimination at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, France, in January 2023, just before its arrival in Gloucester.

Local stitcher Sara Rickard (sarajoyrickard.com) works on her panel for the Costume for Gloucester. Photo: Pauline Lilico The Red Dress: Conversations in Stitch, the much-anticipated book capturing the incredible ongoing journey of The Red Dress – including the many projects like the Costume for Gloucester it has inspired – is published by independent publisher Quickthorn Books UK in Stroud on Wednesday, May 21. ‘I was very drawn to Quickthorn in terms of the unique focus on wellbeing and craft,’ says Kirstie. ‘The ethical and sustainable way the books are produced also aligns with The Red Dress perfectly.’

Kirstie will be discussing The Red Dress project and book, and holding an embroidery workshop, at Hatchards bookshop in Cheltenham on Wednesday, May 28. Tickets are available at hatchards.co.uk/events

voicesgloucester.org.uk/a-costume-for-gloucester

reddressembroidery.com

@thereddress_embroidery

Dr Janina Ramirez hears stories behind the panels on the Costume for Gloucester, at Gloucester History Festival, 2023. Photo: Jon Teague Dr Janina Ramirez models the Costume for Gloucester, with Katie Taylor and Jo Teague, at Gloucester History Festival, Blackfriars Priory, 2023. Photo: Jon Teague Jo Teague working on the Costume for Gloucester. Photo: Voices Gloucester