Johanna Newton

I graduated with a BArch from Unitec, Auckland in 2002. For 15 months I worked at Aimer Naismith Architects, obsessively making my own clothes in my spare time. In 2004 I turned my hobby into a career completing Certificates in Pattern Design and Garment Construction at NZ Fashion Tech and spent 2 years at new fashion label Mala Brajkovic as a pattern maker. After moving to Toronto, Canada I worked at Sears, a large department store as a Garment Technologist responsible for fit and construction for 4 of their in-house brands. Now in London, UK I am the Garment Technologist for Issa London, a designer brand specialising in silk jersey party dresses.
The move from architecture to fashion was more of a slide sideways as I find that the training in architecture has given me the skills of design development, spatial thinking and technical detailing which are interchangeable between the two disciplines.