The Irish designers bringing couture back to Ireland

As Haute Couture Week begins in Paris tomorrow, Carolyn Moore meets the Irish designers bringing the craft of couture back to Ireland.

"I didn’t choose couture — it chose me,” states Helen Cody. “I tried mass production and it didn’t suit me. Everything that’s intrinsic to us and has the DNA of what we do — beading, embellishment, 3D effects — my hand is in the work.”

Couture is all about the handwork. When Haute Couture Week begins in Paris tomorrow, the collections of Dior, Chanel, and the houses which have earned the designation ‘haute couture’, will showcase the work of skilled ‘petites mains’ — the seamstresses and artisans who pour sometimes hundreds of hours into the creation of a single garment.