Hope Macaulay is a luxury womenswear brand by an emerging Northern Irish designer. Hope creates large expressive collaged paintings and transforms them into prints, combined with detailed beadings and knit to create her garments. She also creates her own embellishments, inspired by her passion for ceramic making using Fimo clay and various fabrics and beads combined together.

How did you get into textiles?

My love for textiles began at school when I studied Art and Design for GCSE and A-Level. I love fashion, so all of my artwork that I created at school was fashion related – paintings of shoes, drawings of embellished fabrics, creating heavily embellished garment pieces, ceramic shoes and embellishing onto shoes as well. Then when I did my Art and Design Foundation course at UCA Epsom, I fully discovered that I didn’t just want to do fashion design, but fashion textiles! From there I decided to do my BA Hons degree in Fashion Textiles: Print at UCA Rochester, which enabled me to explore the world of textiles. 

I specialise in digital printing, knitting and beading are my favourite ways to embellish and create garments. My textiles are very colourful and I love how each piece, whether that be a print, a beading or a knitted piece, are unique in their own way and tell their own story. Every textile or garment I make, I change my technique or try something new as it helps me grow my skills. It’s more exciting that way! 

What kind of machinery do you use, if any?

I enjoy creating my textiles by hand – knitting and sewing beads onto fabrics. I think that doing things by hand enables me to be more expressive and create the final outcome exactly how I envision it. Although, the downside is that it takes a lot longer. To create my busy prints, I make large expressive paintings, transfer them onto photoshop and collage them all together.

What other textiles would you like to explore and why?

I would love to explore the idea of creating more of my own embellishments. Using various different types of fabrics, unconventional and found objects then combining them together, almost like collaging with fabrics. I would also like to explore more reusable, recycled and sustainable fabrics as I think sustainability and the environment is an important issue in the fashion industry and in the world today. 

Where do you get your embellishments from?

I get my beads from Beadworks, Creative Beadcraft and Josy Rose.

You apply your textiles to women’s fashion, are there any other areas you’d like to explore?

There are definitely more areas that I would like to explore in the future, whether that be creating fine art pieces or applying my textiles to interiors, menswear or children’s wear. I think that creatively, I have a lot to give and there will never be enough time to do it all.

What brands or designers would you like to collaborate with?

My dream collaborations would be Gucci, Alexander McQueen, Chanel, Shrimps, Delpozo, Ashish and Molly Goddard. Each of these brands produce beautiful textiles and it would be incredible to collab with them.

What do you love about textiles?

I love how there are so many possibilities when creating textiles. I’m able to be as creative as possible, push the boundaries and create my own colourful surreal world through my textiles.

Follow Hope on Instagram here