Maree MacLean is showing two labels at Fashion Week this year. The first is her luxury shoe brand, Maree MacLean, and the second is The Noble Savage, a made to order clothing brand co-designed with Parisian fashion designer, Angela Gallard. Maree had always wanted to fuse her Maori inspired aesthetic in her shoes and clothing designs with another culture, so, when a fortuitous event brought Maree back to her New Zealand homeland from Copenhagen, The Noble Savage began. Parisian Angela Gallard was working as a fashion student for top New Zealand designer Kate Sylvester, when she saw a pair of Maree’s boots. Their collaborative collection in the Miromoda show at this year’s New Zealand fashion week combines Maori tradition with French chic and includes NZ Perino, the Maori knotting technique of Tanniko, spiritual Maori emblems and French silhouettes in 13 excruciatingly cool garments.
The Noble Savage is environmentally conscious, sustainable .luxury. Maree’s career highlight is having her shoes stocked in A Pair, the best luxury shoe shop in Copenhagen. Maree has studied at the Fashion Institute of Technology in Auckland and attended ARS Sutoria School in Milan, a technical institute on the art of footwear. What Maree loves most about fashion is seeing the final results from a collaborative effort & Traveling the globe to find the right stores to position her luxury labels. However Maree continues to be upset by fast fashion that is made with no thought for the environment or made by workers sewing in inhumane conditions, The Noble Savage aims to be 100% sustainable by 2020.
Both Maree MacLean luxury footwear & selected pieces from the debut collection for The Noble Savage will be stocked in boutiques in Dubai, Copenhagen and Paris as well as being sold exclusively online in New Zealand.
