York fashion designer and costume maker Eliza Lamb offers timeless luxury linen dresses that work from everyday walks to weddings

Years of handling beautifully made vintage fashion had already taught her a great deal. Georgina is originally from Lincoln, where she had her own vintage clothes shop. “When I was younger, we always had a lot of books on design at home – my Dad is an architect,” she says. “When I was still at school I used to alter and adapt clothing. I dyed a lot of fabric and used curtains with interesting patterns. It was in the early 1980s at the time of some odd styles. I'm sure what I made was pretty awful.”

She was 20 when she took over the shop, having worked there part-time for the previous owners. “It meant being able to play around with clothes that were absolutely amazing,” she says. “You don’t see anything like that now – the couture items from the 1950s.”

Alongside, Georgina also began working as a costume maker, creating historical garment replicas for theatres and museums. She and her partner, Richard Ison, a sculptor, moved to York 20 years ago. Richard was making replica props for museums, and they both found they were working increasingly in the Yorkshire area. So they sold up and moved to York where they now have a studio in the city centre on Micklegate, having moved there recently from Bishopthorpe Road. They have ground floor studios and live on the upper floors, which they are slowly renovating. Their two daughters are away at university.

Georgina launched Eliza Lamb in 2018 but did not want to name the brand after herself. In search of ideas, she paid a visit to York Cemetery. “I went round all the gravestones and picked out a lot of first names and second names from roundabout 1900 time, and twisted them all around until something flowed. Eliza Lamb just seemed to have a tone,” she says.

Business has grown through word of mouth and returning customers. The dresses, skirts, jackets and skirts at first look simple, but contain a great deal of work, with considered tailoring and structural detail. “I think a lot of that comes from years of handling old clothes,” she says. “You learn how things were made – the layering that goes in to hold it together, the tacking and the weight needed to make it sit well.

“Spending time repairing and copying garments of such quality is a great hands-on way to learn. Even basic workwear from the early 20th century is of incredible quality compared to a relatively expensive item today.

“Over 20 years I built up an enormous collection of clothing from the 1920s to the 1960s. You can take a detail you may see in an 18th-century gown, an Edwardian coat, and a ‘60s cocktail dress, that can find its way into a new design.”

Everything is made and designed in the York studio. Customers can select one of the designs and choose a fabric. A calico toile can be sent out in the post to try before placing an order. There are two sleeve lengths. The dresses are fully lined in cupro, which acts like silk but is washable, and made from cotton pulp with reused water. “It slides on beautifully,” says Georgina. “It makes such a difference to how the clothes sit.”

There are some wools and cords, but most of the clothing is made in linen, chosen for its beautiful drape and its lustrous absorption of dye. Much of the linen comes from Lithuania, where there are many small producers. Georgina says: “It’s really lovely quality. Traditionally, maybe the conditions are just right for growing the flax.”

She considers her designs to be everyday wear to dress up and down, going from walking the dog to special occasions. “I do get a lot of people over the summer buying them for weddings,” she says.

Customers are mostly 40-plus. “A lot of them maybe liked vintage clothes when they were younger,” she says.

“Fashion is always aimed at making people look young, and I think a lot of people don’t want that, and they are glad to find something that has got a bit of style and shape but doesn’t make them look like they are trying to be the height of fashion or overly dressed up.

“Rather than change the design, it’s tweaking the proportions so that they fit differently. As time has gone on, over the years, people wear things in a more relaxed way, a slightly looser fit.”

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It helps to have Richard as a co-worker. “We work quite well in the same environment,” she says. “We are both producing things, even though they are very different - it’s quite nice to have somebody around that knows the process of how you work. It’s support for each other, and you keep bouncing different ideas.

“Lockdown had an impact as I hadn’t been going long,” Georgina says. “But coming out of it made me realise that there's so much potential on your doorstep. I think people became aware of the good things that were in their neighbourhood and then word can spread, and face-to-face contact really helps.”

At the moment the Eliza Lamb studio is open by appointment only, but there are plans to have frequent open days, where people can try on samples and feel and see the fabrics. Georgina says: “The real thing about this is that people can be part of what they buy, and see what happens. Clothing doesn’t come from nowhere.”

Eliza Lamb is at 60 Micklegate, York, and at www.elizalamb.co.uk.