The Australian flag dress got given to me gifted from a friend who worked at a magazine
and they worked with Miss Australia many, many years back.
They were doing a big clear out and she said ‘I know the perfect person that that needs
to go to and that will wear it and do it justice’.
So, I got phone call and she said, ‘I’m coming around to your house and dropping it
off’.
She had told me about it previously before but I had never imagined the scale and the
beauty of what this dress is.
It was always a passion of mine From when I was a kid, I guess.
Just that sort of theatrical, I guess you’d say, child.
I’m 34, born in 1986, and I’ve been doing drag probably for the last three years.
I did some dress ups when I was a kid, I must admit.
Much to my father’s dismay.
It’s not that I wanted to wear women’s clothing
In the sense of being a woman, It’s a character and it’s very much a
persona.
You know, that’s Vin Tage’ and this is me.
So, the Australian flag dress is three meters long
Of the Australian flag with the underneath Originally bunting from Toohey’s New
So that’s all on the underside, Which is quite comical when the winds blows
and it just picks up a little.
Then it’s got the front parfait bit.
The hoop skirt is an actual hula hoop with a handmade cage built into it.
And its designed that it can pack down and travel.
So, Miss Australia was jumping from country to country,
So, it would all roll up and then you could get to the
next country and buy a new hula hoop and then you
would have your crolon cage.
It was incredible!
I never thought I’d see the day when I handed my son his boobs
Thanks Mum.
When I received this gift I was like, Right, I’m going to do this justice.
I wore it in Canada, in New York and in Paris, Ireland
and then here in Australia of course.
The most exciting time I think I’ve ever worn it
was when I was in New York for World Pride.
So I marched with the Australian’s in my Australian flag dress.
Walking down the streets of New York with the Australian crew
Marching in World Pride for the 50 year celebration of the Stonewall uprising
And so that meant a lot to me as well.
So, marching down there.
Wearing this incredible dress, you could hear the crowds, cheering.
Just as I was walking along.
They were just going aaaahh, and they knew exactly
where I was from and what I was about, so, it was very exciting.
I originally borrowed the corset from a friend of mine in Melbourne, Simon.
I just lent it for a while, and I thought this fits this dress perfectly.
So, I have the dress gifted to me, the corset from a friend,
and now we’ve made this collar to go with it.
It is the Aboriginal flag.
It goes over my shoulders.
We go from black to yellow at the back, and then to red.
We had a bit of trouble with the construction and
the weight and it was a bit of a learning curve for us.
I started sewing when I was about 12.
Mum was doing the millinery side of things and
then she was teaching me how to do a straight stitch
and that sort of thing.
Mum showed me how to make a sleeve, And finer details and cutting a pattern and
all of that.
Like it all evolved over time, with learning.
Very frustrating at the beginning when you just want,
You know, ‘I want that, how do it do that?’
And you have to go back and take the steps to get there.
The design is basically Daniel’s brainstorm.
Like I say sitting in the car for five hours waiting for our COVID test.
I said why don’t we do a collar?
So, this is the collar.
And we weren’t going to do a head piece but once
we did the collar we realised that the head piece
had to come into it.
So that’s how it basically came about.
I guess the ideal of the square pieces came from these squares here.
So that’s how they started.
And then we found that to get them to sit right we had to wire them all.
So, each piece is wired and there are about 90 squares there
and we needed to make it a little bit softer, so a bit of netting went in.
We wanted it to be a whole piece.
Even though we are using somebody else’s creativeness on the bottom,
Even the red had to be similar red, And with the flag piece on the top, well that
should bring it all together again.
I would like to think that the person who originally designed it
likes what we’ve done by incorporating indigenous Australia.
I am sure Daniel will wear this well.