MADE IN NEW ZEALAND

Late last year, just as the party season was getting into full swing – and just as many were no doubt breaking out or eyeing up one of her signature silk pieces – our queen clothier for all occasions glamorous, celebratory and just a little bit fancy called last round. In a candid and intimate interview in Viva magazine with her friend and long-time fan, broadcaster Noelle McCarthy, Kristine Crabb confirmed that after nearly 15 years in business, she’d be winding down her much-loved Miss Crabb label – a move that caught both fans and industry peers by surprise, especially coming off the back of what had appeared to be a successful commercial run for the brand in recent years.

But should it have been a shock? In an impassioned press release sent shortly after the announcement, fellow designer Annah Stretton mourned Miss Crabb as another casualty of what she saw as an increasingly fragile and under-threat local industry, going so far as to ask whether we were witnessing “the last hoorah for Made in New Zealand [fashion]?”.

While Kristine herself made clear that the decision to close the label was very much considered and very much her own, in her interview with Noelle, she too was forthright about the growing challenges of running an independent, locally made fashion label in Aotearoa – pointing in particular to stifling creative and commercial pressures, and the stress of securing reliable production in an industry