Whether it’s with lathes or lace, Pinetown designer Mike Wheeler is a winner. The award-winning avant garde designer told Catherine Andrews how he can’t wait to get to his sewing machine after work.
Anyone who has been to the Vodacom Durban July over the past few years and cast an eye over the fashion parade will have seen Mike Wheeler’s creative, avant garde, wire creations.
The big hats crafted from wire and trimmed with a riot of fabrics and feathers, and his quirky interpretation of the annual fashion themes, make Mike’s models stand out in the crowd and catch the eyes of the fashion scouts. His designs frequently make the front pages and picture spreads in the country’s newspapers – and they’ve also bagged Mike a haul of prizes, including a trip to Paris.
But not many people know that behind the fantasy designs is a Pinetown grandfather of three with a day job that is as far removed from the world of fashion as you can get. Wheeler, 68, works in engineering and spends his day in overalls, turning and machining for a firm of gear specialists. Then in the evening, he sits at another kind of machine – his sewing machine.
“Fashion is my hobby,” he says. “When I come home in the evening and at weekends, I design and make garments, as well as wire accessories. I work with metal all day, so wire work is easy for me. And when you look at it, both lines of work are creative.”
Fashion stakes
So, how did a turner come to be a dress designer and give college-trained graduates a run for their money in raceday fashion stakes?
Mike started entering fashion competitions at the Durban July in 1997 – the 100th race meeting of the prestigious horse race. Blessed with three beautiful daughters, Aldytha, Angela and Alicia, he was never short of a model. His first entry, a funky jockey’s outfit, won him third place in the Avant Garde category. The next year he moved up the rankings to second place, and in 2001, his outfit won first place, winning him a trip to Paris.
Since then he has bagged a haul of prizes including seven major first prizes at the Durban July, the Golden Horse Sprint in Pietermaritzburg and the Millennium Carnival competition in Durban harbour in 2000.
His creations include a fantastic interpretation of the Moscow Circus in 2005, an Oriental princess complete with tiny baskets containing sushi and seaweed rice wraps at the Gold Cup in 2006, a Scottish lass with bagpipes in striking orange and green tartan that won first prize at the Durban July and last year’s 2010 World Cup mascot-inspired Zakumi.
So, how did it all start?
Mike credits his interest in fashion to his daughters. “I couldn’t go and watch them play rugby, so I used to take them to modelling shows and my interest grew from there. I had bought my wife, Win, a sewing machine 30 years ago, so when I became interested in sewing, I took it out of the mothballs.”
He took pattern-making lessons with Kloof pattern maker Eileen Lewis and had three months of sewing classes on Saturday afternoons at a Pinetown sewing store.
Since his win in 2001, he has created outfits every year for Durban and Pietermaritzburg raceday competitions. When he hears the fashion theme for the year, he tries to think out of the box and come up with something different. He has no design studio, just a dining table to cut out garments and a sewing machine in the kitchen.
This year’s Vodacom Durban July theme is “It’s a Blooming Great Day” and Mike has put on a floral thinking cap. He’s keeping his ideas under wraps but says one of his garments will be a glamorous gown with raunchy underwear peeping through figure-hugging lace.
Mike is also an athlete, having run the Comrades Marathon twice in the 1960s, coming 93rd and 107th, a Cape to Rio yachtsman and a brown belt in Shotokan karate. And these days, he and Win do ballroom and Latin American dancing for fitness and fun.
There’s just no stopping this live wire.
* The Vodacom Durban July will be held at Greyville Racecourse on July 31. See www.vodacomdurbanjuly.co.za