When I walked into the Tweed Weekly office to meet Jonathan, the editor, I was mostly just hoping I’d find the right door. I’d been asked by my friend (and journalist) Madeline Murray to fill in for her while she recovers from surgery - my first little step into local journalism.
Jonathan looked up, smiled, and said: “I recognise you, you’ll be in the paper tomorrow.”
The week before, Madeline and I had worked on a story about a local collaboration - I had no idea it would end up splashed across the front page.
Full circle moments have a funny way of sneaking up on you.
I first met Dean three years ago at TAFE - I was studying photography, and he was in graphic design. We used to talk about how incredible it would be if students from different creative disciplines actually worked together, like we would in the real world.
Fast forward to now: I’m wrapping up my Diploma of Fashion Design, and Dean has just completed the same Certificate IV Photography course I once did. After a few persistent emails (and a couple of friendly nudges to our teachers), TAFE actually updated their assessments to include a collaboration component.
This semester, our fashion students teamed up with the photography cohort at the M|Arts Precinct studio in Murwillumbah for a full-day professional shoot. It was on that day, amid all the chaos, laughter, and caffeine, that Dean suggested we shoot my collection at Victoria Spring’s studio.
It was a flashback.
Back to where it all began
When I was sixteen, growing up barefoot in the Northern Rivers, I did my mandatory work experience in Victoria Spring’s boutique in Paddington, Sydney.
It was my first taste of the fashion world, and I was completely out of my depth - so desperate not to look like a country kid that I bought the shiniest, most impractical pair of shoes I could find. By the end of my first day, my feet were bleeding.
I was sleeping on my big brother’s university dorm room floor, sneaking his cafeteria meals, and starstruck by every designer I saw. Alannah Hill’s store was next door, and Collette Dinnigan, my absolute idol, was one of Victoria’s close friends.
It was magic and madness rolled into one glittering dream. I decided then that fashion was the life for me.
I made my first wedding dress at nineteen and kept stitching, in Israel, the U.S., and Italy, wherever life took me. I imagined a glamorous, childless life in New York… until motherhood called. I put down my needles and poured my creativity into helping my sisters’ businesses thrive. But without therapy or boundaries, old family patterns resurfaced and, eventually, everything fell apart.
Returning to fashion wasn’t accidental. It was healing. It was deliberate.
Coming home to the craft
When I enrolled at TAFE, it was meant to refine my photography skills, but when I heard the Diploma of Fashion Design and Technology was launching locally, I knew I had to do it.
From the first interview with Polina, our sharp-eyed, impeccably dressed Russian fashion teacher, I felt something awaken. She became a mentor and a compass. Two years later, I’m graduating, and TAFE NSW has announced that the Bachelor of Fashion Design will be offered at our campus next year.
That’s more than a full circle. That’s a spiral upward.
The photo shoot that started it all
So there I was again - in Victoria Spring’s studio, twenty three years later.
Same creative energy, same scent of metal and dust.
Different me.
Dean and I started shooting my collection, Origine, surrounded by Victoria’s vintage jewels and the gentle chaos of her workspace. Halfway through the shoot, I looked down and realised my feet were bleeding again - same story, different decade. Some lessons come back to remind you how far you’ve actually walked.
Two weeks later, those photos were on the front page of the Tweed Weekly.
How it feels to see yourself on the cover
Honestly? Surreal. I didn’t plan it, or even expect it. But maybe that’s the beauty of it, that full-circle things don’t arrive when you chase them. They appear when you’re quietly doing the work.
This story - like most good ones - isn’t about chasing spotlight. It’s about collaboration, reconnection, and remembering why we create in the first place.
So yes, I made it to the front page. But more importantly, I made it back home - to the place where it all began, shiny shoes and all.
The TAFE NSW Kingscliff Fashion Graduation Showcase
Tuesday, December 2, 5pm
TAFE NSW Kingscliff Campus
All pictures captured by James Dean