Clothing designer started at an early age

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Pat Piche started sewing at the age of five. She hasn't looked back since.

Piche, now a clothing designer and producer, is working hard to become a successful business person. "It all started when we danced as a family and attended powwows together. My mother and my grandmother helped me with sewing my first powwow outfits," she explains,

Piche has just completed a one-year course at the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology, graduating as a tailoring technician. "I'm not finished with my education yet though. I'm taking a management certificate program at Grant MacEwan College and the YMCA entrepreneurial course on a part-time basis," Piche says. She says she needs all three diplomas on the wall before she can go into business for herself full-time.

Piche has gained experience in the field, working with Michelle Mitchell, a well-known knitwear designer, and at the now-defunct Mark Messier's Number Eleven clothing store.

Piche has lived in the Edmonton area most of her life, although her family did live in the St. Paul area for three years. "We kept in touch with our Cree and Chipewyan traditions, though."

Now she finds her cultural background is expressed in her clothing designs. She specialized in Native women's western wear when she first began and then expanded into children's and men's wear. " sew traditional dance costumes as well," she adds. She combines leather, denim, lace and rhinestones in carefully co-ordinated designs. She is currently concentrating on jackets and coats, children's clothes, T-Shirts and ladies' skirts and blouses.

For now, however, Piche is content to concentrate on her schoolwork and to sew for craft and trade shows. Her business is small enough that she can operate it from her home. Her plans include getting into production full-time and someday raising a family.

In the meantime she is preparing for the Indian Arts and Crafts Show in the Edmonton Convention Centre in November and the Cowboy Christmas Rodeo Trade Show in December in Hobbema.