Jo Dunlap

Jo Dunlap (nee Farley, 1941 – 1983) left New Zealand with a teaching qualification, but opened a boutique in Darwin to sell her dress designs. In Melbourne in 1976 she won the Australian Gown of the Year with Electra, a polyester jersey jumpsuit and voluminous cape lined in silver Lurex.

She and her husband David entered many design competitions over the next few years often using leathers and suedes. Jo’s deerskin trimmed four-piece leather suit in brown (jacket, gauchos, hat and satin bodysuit), made for the 1979 Benson and Hedges Fashion Awards coordinates section, is relatively traditional, but two outfits from 1978 entered into the Australian Gown of the Year competition were rather less so. One, “Solar Flare’ has a body section of flame shapes made of New Zealand leather, hand dyed red and machine embroidered in yellows and oranges, with sleeves and culottes of three layers (red, pink and yellow) of nylon chiffon cut very full and edged with ruffles.

Seventeen Dunlap outfits are preserved in the EHCO collection.