WARDROBE CRISIS with Clare Press

In the last of our mini series, Made in Melbourne, we meet Australia’s National Designer of the Year 2025, Amy Lawrance.Amy launched her namesake label just a couple of years ago, but she's highly experienced - working for other labels, teaching at RMIT, and she is an extraordinary, couture-standard maker.Her architectural patterns are blisteringly original, she uses mostly undyed silks and has been experimenting with decorative embroidery stitches that she discovered studying vintage dressmaking manuals.As she tells us, her atelier is "very, very small scale and very, very hands-on"; everything from pattern-making, to sampling to final production is by her own hands. "A lonely team of one!" she jokes, but she loves it. Not that it comes without challenges. Any small fashion business owner will be familiar with these. Like, how are you going to pay for it all? Will you need a second job forever? At what point should you give up? Or shift your aims from running your own show to helping grow someone else's visi