Hang on to your hat

Four millinery students teamed up to open their own hat shop in Newcastle, making and selling original designs as well as artwork.

Exclusive, one-off designs at Mad Hatter Millinery.	Original artwork is sold alongside the hats

Newcastle residents Maxine Nieuwenhuizen, Susan Mattey, Jennifer O'Brien and Madeleine Sobb met at TAFE in 2008 when they enrolled in the Millinery Certificate II course. 

After completing the course they each set up as sole traders and worked from home. 

Then Madeleine spotted an article in the local newspaper about the Renew Newcastle initiative and attended an information session about it. 

Shortly after, in June 2009, the women took over an empty shop on Hunter Street owned by the GPT Group.

Mad Hatter Millinery 

The Mad Hatter Millinery team is a joint venture, with each person operating as a sole trader within that structure, but sharing the costs of running the space.

"In our shop customers will find unique handmade hats, most of which are one-off designs," says Madeleine. 

"We each bring something different to Mad Hatter Millinery which contributes to the mix and makes the business what it is. 

"Maxine does practical but stylish designs such as warm felt berets for the winter months and is also an artist who loves to paint landscapes, particularly of the Stockton area. Many a customer has admired her work through our shop window and is surprised to discover that what they are admiring is a painting not a photograph! 

"Jennifer produces outrageous, fun and exciting pieces, Susan loves glamour and rich colours while I can't stick to just hats and fascinators. I also make handbags and masks."   

Half of the premises are sectioned off as a workshop area where each member of the team has a workstation with a desk, sewing machine, materials and supplies. 

"This area is in full view of customers which we believe is an important aspect in introducing our craft to people," says Madeleine. "Some customers might not be hat wearers but they are certainly interested in how hats are made and often just like to watch us while we work."

The licence agreement 

Under the Renew Newcastle scheme landlords enter into a head licence agreement with Renew Newcastle, and participants in the various projects sign a 30-day rolling licence agreement. 

This means if the landlord wants the space back for commercial use, they give the participant 30 days notice to vacate, and if the participant wants to shut up shop, they must also give 30 days notice.

The Mad Hatter Millinery team - as with all Renew Newcastle projects - pay a weekly participation fee of just $20 to use the space.

Public liability insurance for the projects are covered under Renew Newcastle's umbrella policy, but project participants are required to take out other forms of insurance. 

"We needed to organise contents insurance," says Madeleine. "This was needed to cover our stock, materials and equipment."

Challenges of sharing 

With four people operating as sole traders under the one roof, the Mad Hatter Millinery team's biggest was setting up the shop and workspaces to suit everyone, finding the furniture they needed and fitting out the shop to make it look presentable.

Newcastle residents Maxine Nieuwenhuizen, Susan Mattey, Jennifer O'Brien and Madeleine Sobb met at TAFE in 2008 when they enrolled in the Millinery Certificate II course.

"We needed to be mindful of me because I use a wheelchair and need to be able to access all areas of our space," says Madeleine.

"As we had not originally intended to open a shop, all this had to happen very quickly once we were in possession of the key and had started paying the weekly participation fee." 

So how were these challenges overcome? "A great deal of consideration was given to the structure and operations of the business in terms of how we would pay expenses, share costs of purchasing equipment and how we would process sales," explains Madeleine. 

"Deciding what to do about these things was hard because while we were sharing the space we are still sole traders and not in a partnership. 

"We overcame these issues through research, liaising with other Renew Newcastle projects to see how they had set up their spaces and through much discussion between ourselves in meetings and over the phone."

Benefits of sharing

Being able to open their own shop has given the women at Mad Hatter Millinery the opportunity to stay together, share skills, be with other like-minded creative individuals, and the chance to share their work with the world. 

"Without Renew Newcastle, we would not have even considered opening a shop," says Madeleine. "When we finished our TAFE course, we proposed meeting at someone's home but no one had the space.

"Working from home on your own can be very isolating and uninspiring and restrictive. Creative inspiration often comes more easily when you are being creative with others."

And having the shopfront allows the milliners to share their craft with the public. "Customers are interested to know about the processes of hat making and we love sharing it with them," says Madeleine.

In addition to passing trade, Mad Hatter Millinery has also benefited from a substantial amount of publicity through Renew Newcastle that the women would otherwise not been able to afford. 

The shop is surrounded by other Renew Newcastle projects as well as existing businesses and, according to Madeleine, they have a "wonderful" relationship with each other.

"In terms of other businesses, they are just so happy to see the empty spaces filled and to have life in and around their business. They are friendly and will often recommend us to their customers," she says.

Lessons learned 

One of the major advantages of arts and creative industries temporarily reusing empty spaces is the opportunity to experiment and to see what may or may not work as a commercial venture - although this is by no means the only measure of success. 

"We don't see that our venture is viable in the long term at commercial rates at the moment as what we make and earn in our shop is our sole income," says Madeleine. 

"We understand this and are happy to be doing it as Renew Newcastle participants until the time comes that we may need to move on. We love what we are doing and we knew when we signed up to be part of Renew Newcastle that we could be asked to move out at any time.

"If this is the case, it would be up to us as sole traders to decide if we wanted to continue our business in other ways. These could include working from home and selling online, at markets and even approaching other businesses to stock our designs. 

"Our shop has the potential to become viable if and when hats come back into fashion. We eagerly await that day!" 

Read an interview with Renew Newcastle's Marni Jackson

Read about how Newcastle was renewed

Read an interview with the landlord GPT Group

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