Madam Bukeshla... garments... home textiles... wallpapers and
graphics... art prints... classes in ancient stitch technique...
bespoke making... bringing authenticity to design
"I learnt to handstitch at the age of 6... then honed my love of textile design at Melbourne's RMIT in the early eighties and found myself exhibiting... a naive, personal narrative, celebrating stitch and adornment from another time. Arriving in Perth to fulfil a 6-month artist-in-residency at the age of 24, I'm still here 26 years on, still in love with the ocean and the skies and light of Western Australia. I have maintained an art practice throughout the years, in between motherhood, a home and garden teaching classes from home with sporadic bursts of garments thrown in to the mix. But it wasnt until I met my partner Nath that the courage was plucked to step out with a business– bringing together the elements of my design work with my love of drawing, cloth, stitch and paint."
A little about our shop...
 
Our label Madam Bukeshla and shop space… on the fringe of Fremantle in eclectic Wray Avenue is many meaningful things to us. Comprising shop… 3 upstairs rooms... kitchen, lounge & garden courtyard... this turn of last century structure was primarily established as the hub of our creative and healing life. Our space has evolved naively and organically since 2009… with baby steps as means allow... and is at once… a salon-like boutique for our signature garments... textile products & artworks... as well as for the work of favoured local & interstate makers... our production studio... and finally an enchanting escape for our 'Healing in Stitch’ Workshop series. Added to this we are readying an upstairs room for relaxed B&B sophisticationados... incorporating shared kitchen... lounge... and rustic bathroom looking on to our secluded and eclectic courtyard garden. Building on our approach to engaging with real time and natural cycles in our customary mode... employing spontaneity and immediacy where possible... our ethos in the business whether garment... textile... artwork or service... is about

My artwork arrives childlike... weaving unaffected dreamy scenes that
touch and awaken the simple longing for myth-like beauty... a language
of imagery for contemplation of being... – Trish Bygott

a return to a conscious and principled interaction with our work and an exchange of spirit... rather than goods. Our growing textile range branches out to include handmade linen curtaining… bedcovers… cushions… lampshades and teatowel designs… all variously incorporating handpainted panels… handstitch… or machine-assisted handdrawn line… with bold patterned themes Original illustrated cards… artist-quality prints & bold hand-painted wallpaper drops underpin our custom designs for projects such as painted wall treatments… patterned painted panels for splashbacks… or fully integrated textile and painted interior treatments and consultation. Our hand-crafted garments reflect a natural timeless simplicity with emphasis on the translation to one-off through detailing and handstitch... bold handpainted panels... or with occasional vintage or kimono pieces that come our way. Not attempting to conform to established seasonal cycles affords us the pleasure of building an enlightened and flexible range with endless variations… which we feel provides a much needed remedy to the unsustainable cycle of pressures within the conventional fashion industry… as well as encouraging a relationship with our clientele based on our reputation for the enduring heart of our designs.
The Story of Madam Bukeshla
This is the fictional story written by Fremantle artist and writer Jennifer Kornberger for the launch night of the Madam Bukeshla store...
 
Trish has named her design studio after the famous historical figure Madam Bukeshla, and I think it would be fitting at this opening fo the Studio to tel a little of the story of this enigmatic woman who lived at the turn of the century. She was an artistic and sensitive daughter of the Russian Tsarist and adventurer Anton Bukeshla and the Zulu princess Ata Bukeshla. She grew up in both Africa and Europe, and studied art at the French academy, becoming fascinated with the elements of good design. One of the stories that has come through tells of her visiting the William Morris Studios in England and peering with great longing through the window in the pouring rain at the wallpapers and furnishings. The head designer, who was at that momentslightly tipsy from drinking French red, spied her and invigted her in to share a glass. Hearing that she was an artist, he flung out a challenge: 'Find me a palette of fabrics that matches exactly the flavours of this wine.' Madam Bukeshla took up the challenge. She entered the workroom and turned it upside down: colours, patterns, braids, bibs, bobs, buttons... Out of the creative chaos she emerged triumphant with a stunning combination that took England by storm. She was given a trunk of fabrics, which she took with her as she
continued in her travels, visiting all the dress houses on the continent, collecting as she went more and more trunks of fabric. Then a great longing arose in her to connect with her mother’s heritage. She booked a passage to Africa and lived in the rhythm of song, into colours so boldly put together, beads, sun and women singing as they worked with cloths wrapped around their bellies. She returned to Europe with more boxes of fabric. With all these experiences behind her, Madam Bukeshla went into a textile mill in Brittany and climbed the stairs to the very top of the mill and in the last rrom she found an old woman with a spindle. And then for the second time in recorded medical history, a woman (this time Madam Bukeshla) pricked her finger on a spindle and fell into a deep sleep, which lasted 100 years. When she woke up she found that her name was Trish Bygott. And all the boxes of fabric had survived and here they are in this room, under the table. I must tell you that when Madam Bukeshla went to sleep the whole world went to sleep and had a textile nightmare – millions of soulless garments churned out of factories, ugly things with inane prints, some had never been touched by a human hand. But Madam Bukeshla dreamt of divine cloths, of stitching with strips of silk ad she dreamt of garments so individual that each one had a name. So, now she has her own design studio and others come to the window and peer in to see Trish Bygott 'living that which she loves'.