About Us
How it all started...
I’ve always loved beads, their shape, texture, colour and even the sound they make when I hold them together in my hand! I remember dreaming one night, as a little girl, that I had found loads and loads of beads up the road, by the huge gates of a wealthy neighbour of ours, and I was so happy! I still remember the feeling of disappointment when I woke up the following morning and realised it had all been a dream…
From an early age I’ve appreciated wearing different things. Perhaps partly influenced by my mother who used to make many of our clothes and then decorate them with beautiful and original embroideries. She also used to knit beautiful jumpers with original designs that she would create as she knitted. She had (and still has) an amazing talent for mixing colours and producing the most amazing effects! I remember once in high school a teacher my younger sister and I shared in one of the subjects staring at me one day in class and saying, “I know that jumper!” She had been teaching us for over half a year and had never realised we were sisters until I borrowed my sister’s jumper!
Several years ago I started making some pieces of jewellery for myself as I was never entirely happy with what I saw in the shops and didn’t want to wear the same things everyone else wore! My friends and colleagues at work started admiring my creations and asking me to make some for them and encouraging me to develop it further. So Maria Saint was born!
I love the creative challenge and fun of making intricate as well as very simple and minimalist designs. Like myself, many other women enjoy wearing something different that no one else will have, and so I felt that this was what Maria Saint should be about. No matter how simple the design I only make one item so that other women share my pleasure in wearing something original and unique!
I often take commissions with very vague directions - just an indication of the colour(s), the event for which it is wanted or an outfit to wear with - and I love the whole process of choosing the beads and other materials, complimentary colours, the design and then putting it all together for client approval! I always come up with several designs and sometimes the client ends up taking more than one!
My passion for design
I’ve always had a passion for fashion & accessory design and started making clothes at a very early age. First for my dolls, later for myself and then also my mother and younger sister. Even taking a few commissions.
I learnt to use a sewing machine at the age of seven. I’d pestered my mother to teach me but she was afraid I’d damage the machine and hurt myself in the process. So, one weekend when my parents were away and my eldest sister needed something sewing which would take ages by hand, I just went to the machine and did it! It was an old Singer machine, black with a beautiful gold pattern on it. The spool kept jamming and my brother had to unscrew the whole casing several times, but I was determined. For several months afterwards I sneaked to the machine whenever my mother wasn’t around, until one day she was struggling with time to finish some bedding and I offered to help. She thanked me and said she wouldn’t have the time to teach me, to which I shyly replied she wouldn’t have to. I’d taught myself! I thought she was going to be angry, but instead she just smiled and said, “Ok. Show me what you can do!”
This passion for design was shared with a passion for languages. As I couldn’t draw well I decided to focus my education and professional career on the latter, but used every spare minute to continue developing my sewing. The Burda magazines were an incredible help for patterns and also to learn how to finish my work with quality. Then whenever I browsed through clothing stores I always looked inside jackets, shirts and dresses to see how the finish had been done! By doing this I could learn how it was done and later also detect if it was a good quality finish.
When I was 18 my mother decided to invest in a new electric Singer and the model she bought included a free pattern making course, which I completed while on vacation from university. From then on I just started to create my own designs. I was still frustrated I couldn’t actually draw a figure but remembered I’d always been good at geometrical drawing and so I decided to start with a robot type drawing, then placing tracing paper over it and reducing the shape. At first I had to repeat the process several times before I would eventually arrive at the required shape of a woman to use as a basis for drawing clothes. This gave me the confidence to continue. My eldest brother, an architect who can draw anything, was very encouraging and helpful with technical tips, constructive criticism. Each time I showed him a drawing he’d challenge me with a new problem - I was either using a repetitive pose or spending too much time sketching it! Then one day he dared me to draw something in front of him, “just grab a felt pen and do it!”
That sketch is now the Maria Saint brand image.