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Amber Bites Big with Denni Francisco, proud Wiradjuri woman & founder of indigenous fashion label, Ngali image

Amber Bites Big with Denni Francisco, proud Wiradjuri woman & founder of indigenous fashion label, Ngali

S2 E5 · Bite BIG - Boss Women Leading Big Brands
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74 Plays7 months ago

In Episode 11, Amber Bonney Bites Big with guest co-host Denni Francisco - proud Wiradjuri woman, a pioneer in the Australian fashion industry and a strong advocate for First Nations people.

Inspired by Amber's own Mantra, "bite big and chew like hell", in this episode we talk about how Denni's own Mantra centralised around the notion of "Together we create". Denni's mantra has been the guiding foundation of both her business's where she sees collective togetherness as being at the heart of her values, actions and impact.

We talk about the powerhouse that is Ngali, Denni's high-end fashion label which saw her secure her first standalone show as a First Nations designer in 2023! Denni's shares her experience of this journey from the daunting task of preparing for the show to the sense of relief when it was over, only allowing herself to reflect and acknowledge the magnitude of what she had achieved in the weeks and months that followed.

As a First Nations woman, Denni discusses her childhood and the profound influence of her grandmother in shaping the woman she is today and her perspective of the world. Denni delves into how she feels she has a responsibility to take advantage of the opportunities she has had, to understand her privilege, and to help generate opportunities and to shine a light on First Nations creativity.

Bite Big has donated $500 to the chosen charity Dot Com Mob a charity that aims to improve the lives of people living in remote Australian Indigenous communities by providing access to technology centre, Youth IT training & digital inclusion projects.

If you would like to know more about our host Amber Bonney her business The Edison Agency or co-host Denni Francisco you can connect and follow these boss women via their socials links below!

Links:

Denni LinkedIn
Ngali Website
Ngali Instagram

The Edison Agency's LinkedIn
The Edison Agency's Instagram
Amber's Instagram
Amber's LinkedIn 

Dot Com Mob

Credits
Main Host: Amber Bonney
Producer: Niki Beeston
Post Production : Fran Toscano, 17th Street Audio,

Recommended
Transcript

Acknowledgments and Introduction

00:00:00
Speaker
On behalf of the Bite Big Team, I'd like to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land we are recording on today, the Boonrung people of the Kulin Nation. We recognise that with over 60,000 years of experience, First Peoples of Australia are most definitely the original storytellers, designers and artists of this country, and we pay our respect to their elders past, present and emerging.
00:00:30
Speaker
Hello, before we get stuck into this episode of Bite Big, let me tell you a little bit about who the hell I am and why this content's important to me. My name's Amber Bonney, and for the past 25 years, I've been reshaping iconic Australian and international brands, helping them stay relevant, get noticed, and be remembered in the good kind of way. I'm a passionate feminist and committed to advocating for better representation of women in senior creative and marketing roles, which is why this podcast is proudly brought to you by my business, Theatresen Agency.
00:01:00
Speaker
Edison turns 13 this year and we have the privilege of working with some of the world's most influential consumer brands in businesses like Nestle, The Beaker Group, Sahi, Subaru, Uber, Arnott's and local federal government departments.

Amber Bonney and 'Bite Big'

00:01:14
Speaker
If your brand or organization needs help aligning your vision to your reputation, then you can find us at www.edison.agency or you can connect with me on LinkedIn. Let's get into it.
00:01:29
Speaker
Hello, and welcome to season two, episode five of Bite Big, a podcast about boss women leading big brands.

Introducing Denny Francisco and Nagali

00:01:36
Speaker
I'm your host, Amber Bonnie, and today I'm thrilled to be co-hosting this episode with Denny Francisco, a proud Wiradjuri woman and founder of indigenous fashion label Nagali. Welcome Denny.
00:01:47
Speaker
Thank you so much, Amber. Great to be here. Now, just to give our listeners a bit of background, you have over 25 years of fashion experience, first starting out in design and directorship roles for notable fashion houses in Australia and in the US. From there, you launched your very first solo venture, Billy Cart Clothing, which quickly became an iconic brand in the children's fashion category.
00:02:08
Speaker
In 2018, you launched your second venture, Nagali, which translates to we or us in a number of Australian Aboriginal languages. And the proposition of Nagali brings the artwork of talented Indigenous Australians to the forefront with really high quality fashion, clothing and collectibles. As part of this, you work with remote artists to expand their reach and to help promote and foster understanding of First Nations communities.
00:02:31
Speaker
Now, here's a very long list of your recent achievements. You've been twice named Designer of the Year at the National Indigenous Fashion Awards or NIFA. And in 2023, you were awarded the Indigenous Designer of the Year by the Australian Indigenous Fashion Laureate. Also in the same year, you became the first Indigenous Designer to secure a standalone show at Australian Fashion Week with your collection Murray Yang. Nagali was also named one of the 52 newsmakers of 2023.
00:03:00
Speaker
Wow, what a massive year that is.

The Philosophy of Collective Work

00:03:02
Speaker
I'm really interested and I might put in the show notes who the other 51 people were in that list. You're also an active board member of Kinway Indigenous Chamber of Commerce. That's a very long list. I'm fascinated to get under the skin of your personal mantra. So let's kick things off.
00:03:20
Speaker
My mantra is bite big and chew like hell. It's the premise of obviously where we got the podcast name from. Your mantra, if you don't mind me reading this aloud, is together we create, nothing is achieved individually. All the magic happens in the collective.
00:03:37
Speaker
How did this mantra come about? I think, you know, when I was reflecting on our conversation together in preparation for the podcast, well, probably not only then, but often when people ask me that, it's really around, I guess if I look back, it's always been about how we do things with other people, which is much more exciting as you get greater outcomes. It's just a journey to take with other people. And it's just an inclusive
00:04:04
Speaker
philosophy, I guess, which I think is pretty exciting. And is this something that for you, often what happens when we ask people about their mantra is either they say we don't have one, but then they realise they do. It's just the word mantra doesn't necessarily resonate with them. Is this something that you feel like has been with you always or something that potentially was something later in life that started to resonate?
00:04:28
Speaker
I think it's always been with me, but to your point, I think that it's always kind of like sat there without having sort of like a light shone on it or bringing it to the surface. But then when I started Nogali, it was very much about that collectiveness, that togetherness, that coming together for a mutual benefit. So it's stated more obviously now and it's really come to the surface and it kind of like stands there as a beacon of what it is that Nogali is all about.

Collaborations with Indigenous Artists

00:04:57
Speaker
Yeah, well, it'd be great to describe to our listeners a little bit about the premise of Nagali. Yeah, so in 2018, I was not working in the design capacity and I wasn't really working in the creative industry, but I was really missing that creativity. I was also truly aware that I could be doing more to support our community and making a difference and taking responsibility for some of that.
00:05:26
Speaker
Because of my experience in the fashion industry then I thought that fashion would be a really good way to do that. So that came really at the same time that first every year that I went to the Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair and just saw the amazing creativity that comes together in that room in Darwin every year and
00:05:45
Speaker
I became aware of the challenges too for our remote artists when they're creating these incredible artworks and then they need to ship them into metropolitan or urban or even regional areas for exhibitions, taking back anything that hasn't sold or selling when people happen to come by the art centres. So limited reach really in terms of having their artwork up and you're talking about I suppose
00:06:12
Speaker
singular pieces versus the commercial reality of licensing or being able to have your work reproduced multiple times, which obviously changes the revenue income structure. Yeah, definitely. Very fortunately then, the second time that I went back to Darwin, then I met an amazing artist, Lindsay Malay, and just sat and talked to him about my concept.
00:06:35
Speaker
He really got it and really understood it and was really quite excited about it. And that was really the start of the journey. And was this a first in the Indigenous community? No, there's a lot that actually does happen around sort of collaborations and the creation of beautiful textiles and so on.
00:06:56
Speaker
But Lindsay, Malay was working out of the Worman Arts Centre in the Kimberley and they had not worked in this area before, so it was quite new for them. And thankfully the Worman community was on board with this to look at what it would mean and what the possibility of it was. And so there it began.
00:07:19
Speaker
And did it take a long time to work through the commercials of how that would work with the artists or was that something that was quite informally discussed? No, it was quite formally discussed in terms of in consultation with the art centre itself, the art centre manager and then also through the copyright agency that we work with so we could get all of that, all of the royalties agreed upon and
00:07:46
Speaker
I guess put into agreements and so on. It's kind of really important in working in this space for me and also too for others is making sure that the artist is always fully respected. Anybody in the First Nations that produces an artwork, it's their own personal story. So it demands and should have a lot of respect. It's why we don't just take an artwork and translate it as it is or put it onto fabric. It's always a translation.
00:08:16
Speaker
The artist story is not our story to tell. So what we do is we translate the artwork in a way. It might be that we take a piece of the artwork or we translate it in a way that still is a beautiful representation, but the artist needs to agree.
00:08:33
Speaker
with that before that goes. So they're involved in that creative process. So they do the piece. You then take it, work with your creative team and then they need to endorse or approve that. Yes, exactly. And so what's important in that process is just making sure that the ownership of the painting stays with the artist. So the artwork can be sold.
00:08:55
Speaker
And what we do with our collaboration is provide then a passive income stream that comes from that painting through the payment of

Nagali's Principles and Challenges

00:09:05
Speaker
royalties. Yeah, which is ongoing, I suppose, beyond just the singular acquisition of a piece of art. Exactly, exactly. And I was quite excited about that. Yeah. Because it's, yes, because each art piece then just creates more. It's enduring. Yeah, it's enduring in the piece itself, but also to the translations on it, the fact that
00:09:24
Speaker
incredible artwork can be taken off the wall and through clothing and scarves and collectibles can walk the streets anywhere in the world. That's pretty exciting as well. I was at your exhibition last year at the Pullman.
00:09:39
Speaker
It was almost last year as part of Melbourne Fashion Week. And just such beautiful, beautiful work. It was really incredible. I'm interested to know what the response was in your first release from the artists to see their work on such exquisite fashion pieces. What was the feedback? The feedback was really beautiful. Lindsay, Malay and his family have always been
00:10:04
Speaker
amazing and supportive. And of course, when we won the first NIFA award, when I called Lindsay, he was like, oh my God, that's so amazing. I feel so emotional. It was just so beautiful because you just realise that, you know, that's the collective. I want to talk about Nagali and Black Ethics and its principles. What are some of those guiding principles and how do you hold Nagali accountable to that?
00:10:33
Speaker
So there's a set of principles, which is all about integrity, transparency, mutuality, respect, a whole lot of these really, I guess, values that most people would be aware of, and many people live by, but it makes
00:10:48
Speaker
It makes us accountable for what it is that we do and how we do it. And when you actually look at all of those, it does come, it can still come under that heading of together we create because when there's transparency, respect, mutuality, you know,
00:11:03
Speaker
You know, we have it in our studio and I absolutely would say that, you know, there's none of those values that we don't live by because that's the foundation of what it is that you do. Yeah. And so you make that visible in the studio. And do you think, is that something that all First Nation businesses would abide by? Is that something really important culturally for you?
00:11:32
Speaker
It's important for me, and it really came, that concept of black ethics came through a working session that I did with a woman, a First Nations woman called Linda Rael, and she just had a beautiful way of actually expressing what those values were. And when I saw them, I thought, this is us, this is us, this is actually how I want the galley to operate.
00:11:58
Speaker
It was very early when we started Nagali and it just steamed in that session that I did with Linda, that it all came together with such incredible clarity around how we wanted to work, what was to be our way of working. And I imagine that that's...
00:12:13
Speaker
really going to be something that's defined your business from the ground up, from the way that you discuss royalties and negotiate in the best interest of your Indigenous artists all the way through to people that you employ. In the industry, with the premise of, I suppose, the things that you believe in in regard to the principles of Black ethics, what do you want to see more of?
00:12:39
Speaker
And I'm talking broadly in the fashion industry, which is going through a big degree of change, I suppose, in the last kind of five years compared to where it's been. What do you want to see different? I think I want to see that First Nations fashion can just be high quality, high level fashion. It's fantastic that more is happening in the First Nation fashion space.
00:13:04
Speaker
But for runways and awards or events that actually happen, for the opportunity for our First Nations creatives to stand in that industry,
00:13:20
Speaker
as designers and as creatives who happen to be Indigenous. Because even when we talk about First Nation fashion brands and so on, it's actually great from a point of view of shining a light on the fact of what happens in this space, which is incredibly exciting. But there's

Australian Fashion Week Experience

00:13:38
Speaker
also too still a sort of a separation that actually happens.
00:13:42
Speaker
And I think that that is probably going to happen over time because, I mean, it was only two or three years ago that Australian Fashion Week did a welcome to country. So it's not very long ago. No, it's not very long ago. And then you think of the runways that they've done and then last year to be holding the first solo runway. So things are progressing.
00:14:04
Speaker
And I think that it will progress, continue to progress, but I think that we continue to shine the light on. I mean, I just get excited, so excited when I sort of see how much creativity exists in our space. And what's really great about it is that it's quite unique. And then sometimes what seems to be a scene of sameness, then having something that's really exciting, I think is fantastic.
00:14:33
Speaker
Well, you've got over 60,000 years of inherent creativity in storytelling. And as the original storytellers of this country, that's a lot of storytelling and a lot of creativity to come to the forefront. And hopefully we see that sort of expediated over the next.
00:14:51
Speaker
10 years. Let's talk about the experience of the first fashion show. I mean, that would have been quite a significant milestone for your community, but also for you in having been in the industry for 25 years.
00:15:04
Speaker
Yeah, you know, it was quite amazing and, you know, incredible of IMG who run Australian Fashion Week that they gave us that opportunity. And when they gave it the opportunity, I was thinking, oh, you know, maybe we need to be putting together 16 looks or, you know, sort of how will we do that? And then they said, oh, actually, for a solo runway, you need at least 30. And I was like, oh, my goodness me.
00:15:29
Speaker
And so I was a little overwhelmed by that because what we do is we try to keep our collection very tight as part of our sustainability commitment. But then I just broke it down into six lots of five. And once I started to break it down, it made it easier. It made it easier and work with a fantastic creative director who
00:15:50
Speaker
you know, sort of saw the vision of what it is that I wanted to do. And it wasn't quite as daunting as I thought that it would be. Well, yeah, I mean, just, you know, knowing a solo exhibition anywhere sounds daunting, but especially Australian Fashion Week.
00:16:07
Speaker
Yeah. And what that offered us was the opportunity to bring in more of our First Nations. So again, that together we create. We had 22 other First Nations involved in that runway. So models, artists who painted the boots, creatives who did the accessories, people sort of like backstage, people who came in to shadow some of the professionals from a learning sort of like point of view.
00:16:33
Speaker
It was incredible because for me, it gives you goosebumps now just thinking about it. It was a culmination of the vision of what we can do in this space. And I imagine, was that exceptionally emotional on the night for you?
00:16:47
Speaker
You know, I think it didn't get emotional until afterwards. And in fact, you were probably running on adrenaline, you know, like in those kind of fight or flight moments that are so high pressure. I imagine that in that situation, you just didn't have time to to reflect. But what was that sort of quiet time afterwards like?
00:17:05
Speaker
Well, it was like, wow, did that really happen? And you know, people talk about when you do a major event or you do something, there's always that sort of downtime, like all that time when you kind of go, oh, you know, the lull. But I think what
00:17:22
Speaker
It really hit me when I came to it Melbourne. I was invited to be on a panel. It was actually part of Melbourne Fashion Week after the event and I got really emotional when
00:17:39
Speaker
Leila from Australian Fashion Council asked me how I felt about that. I got emotional. I was sitting there and I was getting really embarrassed. I was getting tears in my eyes because I thought, wow, that happened. When I think about it, it's not the fact that Nagali did that. It's actually the fact that first nations did that. Yeah. Well, I was going to say, that's what I love about
00:18:04
Speaker
what you do and what you advocate for and champion is not about Nagali, really. It's about the opportunity and pathway that Nagali can offer your community. And then the inspiration that becomes for other Indigenous First Nations businesses to say, well, she did that and then you can become, I suppose,
00:18:27
Speaker
a mentor, an advisor to those emerging designers and artists coming through the ranks. So congratulations on that. I mean, what an incredible achievement and an incredible opportunity for future generations to follow in your footsteps.
00:18:43
Speaker
Yeah, it's a really humbling experience in many ways. Like when people said, you know, how did I feel about winning the awards? You know, like I was almost, it's almost kind of, I felt a little embarrassed by it and felt a bit uncomfortable. I couldn't really, when people said, you know, how do you feel about winning this award second year in a row? I couldn't really speak to it because I was just like,
00:19:04
Speaker
It should be more. Like, it shouldn't be me again. Like, it should be more. But when I actually spoke to Lindsay and Lindsay said again, oh my God, I'm just crying, then it kind of like... You realise, you were just the... Yeah, I suppose you're the figurehead, but the impact is...
00:19:19
Speaker
is felt wider than that. Yeah, that's what makes it meaningful, really.

Business Motivations and Lessons

00:19:24
Speaker
You know, it's just sort of the space just gets wider and wider for opportunity. So, you know, that's a good thing. It's a beautiful thing. There's plenty of time for, you know, sort of so many more of our creatives, you know, to come and create your own magic. Yeah, we have started the, I suppose, the tidal wave and hopefully that continues to roll through.
00:19:44
Speaker
Let's talk a bit about pivoting and agility because you've started two businesses. So Billy Cart was, you know, a successful business. What motivated you to start the second business and what did you learn from Billy Cart that you've applied to Nagali?
00:20:01
Speaker
Yeah, I think if I look back at Billycutt, I would say that Billycutt started accidentally. It was something that I was doing for my daughter and then people said, can you do that for us? And so it opened up this opportunity or this niche in the marketplace for great children's clothing. But even that business was a collective business because we sold direct to people. So we had
00:20:25
Speaker
at the height of it, about 900 salespeople around Australia who actually sold the product into people's homes. But what that did is it gave women opportunities to work around their children. Because that model doesn't really exist very much anymore. It's sort of the, I suppose, the new tramedics.
00:20:42
Speaker
model, the Tupperware model. At that time, was that quite a popular thing or was it still? I don't think it had ever been. It hadn't been ever done in fashion before. In fashion, no. And so that again was just bringing together these amazing women from all around Australia, you know, under this common concept, I guess, of children's clothing and
00:21:04
Speaker
We did a lot of educational and learning programs within that space. A lot of our sales team have gone off to do businesses of their own or still talk about what they learned from that. So it was quite a foundational platform, I suppose, to help women with independence. So having an income when they were child-rearing, which, as we know, is still a problem for women who choose to have children. They're still typically the primary carers and they still find getting paid work
00:21:33
Speaker
can be difficult when you're juggling the parenting. So, yeah, even progressive, even back then. Well, it's interesting because you think about, I often think we thought we started a children's clothing business, but we actually didn't. We actually created a business for women to earn an income around their children in a way.
00:21:56
Speaker
It became that because I started off designing the clothing and so on, and then I was joined by a partner, Niamh McCall, who's much better designer than me. So I ended up working with all of the sales people. So all of the relationships and the concepts around that was something. I woke up one day and went, oh my God, at that stage, I think 250 people to work with, it was freaking me out.
00:22:21
Speaker
But all of that was around that bigger picture. Yeah, which I imagine would have been exceptionally helpful. That experience in relationship and I mean, you can call it sales, but really it's about relationships would have been pretty critical for Nagali. Yes. Understanding the commercial realities plus how to keep those connections and those people.
00:22:46
Speaker
Yeah. And then if you look, and I hadn't thought about it like this until just now, but if you think about it in that under the mantra, together we create, Billy Cut was able to achieve what it achieved because of that collective vision of all of those women as well.

Barriers for First Nations Women in Business

00:23:01
Speaker
So together with 900 women around Australia, that's what we were able to create together, even though, you know, we started the business, but it was the culmination of everybody coming together to achieve that.
00:23:15
Speaker
And I guess in a way, Nagali is, if you think about the internet, that's the modern version of Billikart, because the internet actually takes the product straight to people. Straight to people, rather than in their lounge room or kitchen.
00:23:33
Speaker
And so they, so we would say about e-commerce, you can't try things on and all of that. Well, any of those showings that we did with the children's guy, the children weren't there either because they were mainly at night, kids were already in bed. So it wasn't, you know, so people still, you know, would choose what they thought was going to work and around sizing and so on. And that process, if they had to exchange anything. We're still the same process. So in a way,
00:24:00
Speaker
I don't know. In a way, it'd be great to have, you know, people more involved in the Dali doing that, I guess, through their relationships in e-commerce. Who knows? Well, there you go. That could be a next step. I want to talk a little bit about obstacles that you have faced in your career, not just as a woman, but also as a First Nations woman. What are some of the biggest challenges that you've faced in business and specifically with Nagali?
00:24:28
Speaker
I think, and I'm very conscious of this, I think as a First Nations woman, I haven't had a lot of barriers because I could be seen as being anything, you know, in terms of how I look. Your physical look. Yeah, my physical look, and also too that our family are not connected to community through stolen generations.
00:24:53
Speaker
not as much in community. So we have the incredible, myself and my family have the incredible responsibility to, you know, I guess to do what we can under that understanding because we privileged in that way. Yeah, so you don't feel you've been as disadvantaged as some First Nations groups and therefore
00:25:18
Speaker
What can you do to help? Yeah. And there's plenty of people like me out there doing that and doing amazing things. I think as a business woman, I just think it's really simple. I think for women in business, it's actually funding. When you look at venture capitalists, you don't want to know what we're 1.7% of venture capitalists. It's so male dominated.
00:25:45
Speaker
Yet, there's so much research around that women make great business people. They can build successful businesses. In a recent episode of Bite Big, I spoke with Michelle Redfern, who's a staunch advocate for women in business, but she really focuses on what she calls the BQ of business. She said women innately
00:26:10
Speaker
in her opinion, have the emotional skills to understand relationships. She believes the gap is actually teaching people the business skills to hold those positions, whether it's in the boardroom or whether it's about getting funding. I suppose that's, you know, a similar challenge that you're highlighting. It's actually in the people who are making the decisions about the funding. Potentially, that's where, you know, you wonder if
00:26:36
Speaker
where quotas need to be brought into place about, you know, I know that there's a lot of venture capitalists that focus just on women, but obviously not enough when you look at the national percentages of women, female businesses being funded.
00:26:52
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And then if you overlay that for First Nations women, it becomes even more challenging, because it's not a lot of First Nation people who have generational wealth.
00:27:07
Speaker
if any, you know, if you if you think back, you know, you know, this is an area that my daughter did her PhD. And if you look at what's actually happened over time, where we weren't allowed to earn wages, where we weren't, you know, when we were paid with tea and coffee and sugar, and there was never an opportunity to bring to bring in generational wealth.
00:27:32
Speaker
So therefore there's not that foundation that First Nations people can rely on. So it's almost like starting from a very start looking at what personal assets people might have and how they've worked to get those and so on. It's a whole different area when we look at venture capital funding or funding of any sort when we think of First Nation businesses.
00:27:58
Speaker
Yeah. We look at the challenge for women and then we overlay it with that, then it's an incredibly difficult space, complex space to play in. And I suppose in that generational gap, it's also about
00:28:15
Speaker
just the people, individuals feeling like they have a right to be there. So there's a confident thing. Then there's the, I suppose, the layer of, you know, parents being able to support their children, not just financially, but even just with the business skills or the financial acumen becomes a gap. So there's a lot of obstacles to overcome. Do you think the government are doing enough in this area to support First Nations women?
00:28:40
Speaker
Yeah, well, also, I mean, just on that other point, too, there's also to the cultural safety issues, too, that come into play on that, the other part that we were just talking about. And I know I don't think that the Australian government is doing enough. You know, there's a whole thing at the moment around, you know, this probably gets very bit political. No, go for it. This is a safe space.
00:28:59
Speaker
But there's a whole thing around the Australian government to sort of say, you know, we want to support First Nations for export. But, you know, Nagali is completely export ready. We can't get any support to take advantage of the opportunities that we actually have to do that.
00:29:16
Speaker
And if we can do that, we get to employ more of our, we can get to employ more of our mob within our business and so on. And then we talk to people like us trade and they say, well, we don't really do fashion. Well, fashion is a seven billion dollar industry to Australia and 1.7 billion of that is in export.
00:29:40
Speaker
So how do we say that one of our major government institutions say that they don't really do it, they don't understand and so on.

Influential Women and Inspiration

00:29:49
Speaker
They understand beer and wine, which is less in terms of export dollars than fashion is. So how does that make sense? It's kind of crazy. And if you think about
00:30:00
Speaker
all of the things that go off fashion, you know, whether it's videographers, photographers. Yeah, it's quite a complex ecosystem, isn't it, of other creative people? It's a really big ecosystem. And that's the frustration in that not being seen. Not being seen. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm hoping that
00:30:21
Speaker
Something gets done about that. Given we're talking about government, I'd imagine that that will be slow going. Let's talk about being a brand boss. This podcast is based on the premise of boss women and being a boss woman is a contentious title and something that we spoke a lot about in terms of, you know, can we take ownership of the word boss and what does that mean? And I know there's
00:30:50
Speaker
Lots of people will say, well, you can just be a boss. You don't have to be a boss woman. But we liked the sentiment of taking ownership with that. What does that mean for you, the premise more so than the word of being a boss woman? Yeah, you know, the premise actually does resonate with me really strongly because as we alluded to already, I think women bring so much to the table and there's so much around that whole EQ area, building relationships and so on.
00:31:20
Speaker
And women, in general, I think, tend to do things in the collective. I mean, you know, I'm always conscious when I'm speaking and I see things a certain way. I have a lens, which we all do. We have a lens in which we look through.
00:31:35
Speaker
My lens around women in business and so on might be different to how other people see things, but I do think that women have such an incredible capacity to make
00:31:51
Speaker
strong sort of social change and build great businesses and make much more of a contribution to Australia's economy than they currently are or have been able to. Certainly getting credit for and certainly getting funding for as she pointed to. Funding and credit for, right, yeah. So I think
00:32:09
Speaker
the concept of, you know, I would say the boss women, more like sort of strong women, women that actually, you know, will stand on the whatever frontier it has to be in order to make things happen. To do that. Yeah, it's just so important. Yeah. Are there women that you hold in really high regard that you believe are people that are shifting the dial, past or present?
00:32:33
Speaker
Yeah, you know, my First Nations grandmother was amazing, like incredibly, incredibly strong, didn't really take a lot of crap from anybody. I like her already. Yeah, it was really tough. So, you know, sort of whether it was snakes coming across the road or whether it was, you know,
00:32:55
Speaker
out shooting pigeons or whatever it happened to be, you know, she was amazing. And, you know, so that's sort of from a family point of view. I have an incredibly strong daughter as well, who inspires me every day. And she has a really interesting way of looking at things. We're different in, you know, we're different. She's sort of like, I don't know, I would say maybe sort of like more
00:33:19
Speaker
on the academic side, although she probably wouldn't like me to say that, whereas I'm on the creative side, but she appreciates that and she has a good understanding of business. So I admire her thought processes of how she sees things and her passion in the First Nations space. And is that the area? So I know you mentioned she did her PhD in that area. Is that her, I suppose, professional area as well as her academic area?
00:33:46
Speaker
Well, she works in Indigenous business leadership, so she kind of like brings that sort of passion to that. So we're talking and looking for and seeking economic independence.
00:34:00
Speaker
And then there's just women that you see that's doing something, like making something happen. Like what you're doing around having these podcasts with women, with people who sort of support women in a whole lot of different ways. Yeah, I mean, there's so many women. And what I do love is when I sit in the space of women, whoever they are, whether I know them or not,
00:34:29
Speaker
and I hear them speak and hear their own personal mantra or their own vision, then that's just so inspiring. That inspires you. Yeah, I feel the same way often when I'm so energised when I meet
00:34:46
Speaker
women doing really great things. I mean, of course I'm energized when I see anyone doing great things, but particularly when I know that women have had to overcome, you know, probably more challenges and more hurdles to do that. I find that really personally energizing and motivating. Like that's my happy place. Uh, if I, you know, go somewhere and I hear someone speak and I was at a, the future women did a international women's week.
00:35:12
Speaker
two-day summit and just the incredible diversity of women from people in their early 20s all the way through to people in their 70s who are still working and advocating for women was just so inspiring to be in that space. I feel like that it sort of keeps motivating me.
00:35:34
Speaker
Well I went to, I was invited as part of the Marie Claire Woman of the Year. I was nominated in that fashion category but went up for that event and I don't know there must have been 400 women in that room you know and that age group was probably very similar to what you were saying and then for all of the nominees that they did a little video of and then they had somebody who was actually speaking to that group
00:36:01
Speaker
Oh my God, I just about cried all the way through, like so many stories, so many outcomes, and young women doing incredible things. And I remember sort of sitting there thinking, the world's gonna be okay. The world is gonna be okay when you look at these women. And the energy in the room was something that I've never experienced before. Yeah, and I think what's important about that energy is the,
00:36:29
Speaker
I suppose the multi-generational respect for each decade of women at all these different age groups, all either leveraging the wisdom of people that have been in their position before or paved away the respect they have for those women, and then
00:36:49
Speaker
if you're the women at the, you know, the autumn or winter end of your career, you know, the respect and the faith that they have in the younger generation. I think that's a really beautiful thing that, you know, I believe that from a feminist perspective,
00:37:05
Speaker
the more that we can eradicate competition between women, the better off women are. So that's, you know, for me, that means a lack of judgment for other women, a lack of, you know, and a collaboration with women. And it's taken a really long time for me personally to undo
00:37:23
Speaker
I suppose maybe just the social structures of competition, maybe that's just a maturity thing, but, you know, of judging women or making, I suppose the biases that can come without making assumptions about people. So I've had to undo a lot of that, you know, and that could be age, but to try and be respectful to all people and not to cast judgment.

Proudest Achievements and Vision

00:37:48
Speaker
Yeah, and I think you're right. I think, you know, we can catch ourselves or we, you know, that's that lifelong learning process, isn't it, of things that we realize when we start to really look within ourselves on the things that are really important. So when I was nominated with the Marie Claire Fashion Designer of the Year, I was nominated with four, three other women. And when Rebecca Valance won that award and I heard her story,
00:38:18
Speaker
She's been going for something like 20 years. Nagali had been going for five years. For her to go through all of that, she talked about what she had to do through COVID to keep her team together, to balance all of that. I didn't have any of that. I was so happy that she won that award. It was like she deserved that award. Hearing her story was like go you, really amazing.
00:38:47
Speaker
And I think that's, that's part of what you're saying about when we kind of like step back and go, it's not about an award, it's actually about hearing the stories of resilience of what people and women have been able to overcome in order to get to where they are.
00:39:02
Speaker
and still be grateful. You know what I mean? Like get to this point, they've overcome challenge after challenge after challenge or had to just work that a bit harder than their male counterpart in the same, you know, industry. But the sense of gratitude that they still have for being there rather than resentment I think is, yeah, is quite amazing. Let me ask you, what are you most proud of?
00:39:30
Speaker
over the last 25 years, what are the things that fill you with pride? Yeah, I'm most proud of the daughter that I brought up, the person that she's become, the woman that she's become, you know, as a single parent, I do, you know, you bang and crash your way through life a little bit, you know, and hope that everything they're doing is going to turn out okay. And so I'm very proud of
00:39:55
Speaker
that and who she is and I've been able to be the person that's navigated her through that journey. And then the other is, you know, I think really quite proud of what happened at Australian Fashion Week because of what it meant collectively, but also to what was created for Billy Cott clothing. So they're the two, the three
00:40:19
Speaker
things that I'm probably most proud of because they've had the most impact, I think, positive kind of impact. I want to ask about your biggest bee moment. So we, on every episode, Bite Big starts with two bees. It's as simple as that. Is there a bee moment that has had the most impact for you?
00:40:40
Speaker
I think probably bold. And what that's about is just being bold enough, I guess. It could be tied into being brave, right? But just bold enough to continue down the path of a vision that you have.
00:41:02
Speaker
Yeah, I'm thinking here is there a difference for me for being brave or bold, but so maybe it's both of them. It could be both. Yeah. I mean, you mentioned in your first solo exhibition, I mean, the
00:41:16
Speaker
the bravery of like knowing you had to do a, did you say a 30? 30 looks to go. 30 looks, which is a lot. I mean, I don't know a lot about the fashion industry, but that sounds like a lot to curate.

Resilience and Ancestral Guidance

00:41:31
Speaker
You know, I'd say that's brave and bold in not only executing that, but in being able to break that down into bite-sized chunks of achieve, you know, to be able to achieve that.
00:41:44
Speaker
Yeah, I think so. And with those two things interconnected, because there's times when things get scary, you know, and I think for all business owners, things get scary. And we spoke about that earlier, that we're in a, you know, challenging economic times, the increase of, of costs, the increase of, you know, labor or manufacturing, human costs, it's, you know, they're difficult times and running a profitable business is challenging.
00:42:13
Speaker
Yeah, definitely. And there's a number of things for me that ties into that. There's that, gosh, hope you can make this business sustainable for the long term. There's a responsibility about it being a First Nation business and how I feel incredible importance around making it successful in that space. And there's times when it's really challenging and you think, oh my god,
00:42:38
Speaker
But, you know, I have this thing about hold steady, I just say to myself, hold steady, hold steady, it'll be okay, just hold steady, you know, because sometimes it's like, oh, you know. And then I was also, I was, I had this advice given to me once about, you know, however it is, however you're feeling right now, doesn't mean to say you'll feel the same way this afternoon or tomorrow. So if you're really scared now,
00:43:03
Speaker
doesn't mean to say that you feel that stuff to do, because in the meantime, a solution could come up or something could happen. So there's a lot of trust in that as well. There's a lot of
00:43:15
Speaker
that trust for me too comes from my connection to my ancestors, definitely. So I talk to them, I feel guided by them, I find strength from them. And so in those really difficult times, just to keep going. And do you find, how do you stay connected to that? Like when you are in a metropolitan environment, you're in the hustle and bustle of business life, how do you stay connected to those strengths?
00:43:45
Speaker
Well, I think they're always there, no matter where you are. So they're always there. But very much being out on country is great because being out on country provides space. And if you can go out on country and turn off all the noise that's in your head and sit in the silence of what country delivers, that's where creativity lives. That's where ideas come from. That's where strength comes from, belief.
00:44:15
Speaker
and all of that. So yeah, you know, that's a collective journey, I guess. That's the magic. Is there something that you wish you had of read or seen or heard when you were the emerging younger version of yourself? So, you know, imagine yourself at 18 or 20 or 25. Is there something that you wish
00:44:41
Speaker
you could have given yourself back then or something that you potentially even give to other young women now to say, you know, this is a really great book or this is a really great, it could be a TED Talk.
00:44:53
Speaker
Well, you know, it's an easy one for me. I wish I'd grown up in community and, um, you know, that I, that I learned, I had more time with my grandmother. I wish I'd had that. I wish, um, that, that I, yeah, I was surrounded by community. Um, and, and so if I'd had that, then my daughter would have had that as well. Yeah. So, um, so yeah, I think, you know, that's what, what it would be. Yeah.

Closing Reflections and Gratitude

00:45:22
Speaker
I love that. That's beautiful.
00:45:23
Speaker
Well, Denny, we are coming to the end of our show. Thank you for being such a gracious and humble co-host and for showing us your version of Biting Big today and aspiring to your mantra. Together we create. Nothing is achieved individually. All the magic happens in the collective. And I think all of the conversations that we spoke about really brought that to light, the idea of magic and collective, which is really beautiful.
00:45:49
Speaker
I especially loved what you spoke about with Black Ethics and how you've made them visible in your business and how they guide your decision making. I applaud you on your experience with Fashion Week and how
00:46:05
Speaker
you have created, I suppose, a benchmark for future generations of First Nations artists and creators. And I'm sure, as an industry, there are many people who are congratulating you and are grateful for that. I love how you spoke about your daughter and her leadership in Indigenous Centre at Melbourne University, and we'll definitely put that in the show notes. We might also put in the show notes how you spoke about Rebecca Vallance, if there's something that we could put in there about her.
00:46:34
Speaker
But I also loved how you spoke about boldness in continuing on a path with a clear vision. I think that's really important. And the sentiment of Hold Steady, I think that that's a really beautiful sentiment. So thank you for sharing that with us.
00:46:49
Speaker
And, you know, it's important to mention that this podcast is produced and made by women, for women. And to show our gratitude, we have donated $500 on your behalf to your chosen charity, which is dot com mob. That's charity that aims to improve the lives of people living in remote Australian Indigenous communities by providing access to technology centers, youth, IT training and digital inclusion projects. Tell us a little bit about why you chose dot com mob.
00:47:16
Speaker
Yeah, well, it's I think every business has a responsibility to be a business for good. And so, you know, giving back as without saying, but for me, education has always been really critical, you know, and I always thought that the best
00:47:30
Speaker
gift I could give to my daughter was the best education possible. I think for our kids living in remote areas, for their literacy and IT skills through dot com mob just resonates with me because the more that we can do that and support that, just imagine them being able to stay in community, setting up online businesses, doing all of that. Yeah, I'm quite passionate about that course.
00:47:51
Speaker
Yeah, well, considering especially what you said about that you wish you had have grown up in community, that makes a lot of sense because being able to stay connected means that, yeah, you can grow up in community but still have a fulfilling, flourishing life being with the education and the technology. Yes. Well, thank you. Thank you, Denny. I am really looking forward to bringing this podcast to the world and thank you for your time and your graciousness.
00:48:19
Speaker
I'm your host, Amber Bonny, and until next episode, I hope you bite big and chew like hell. Thanks, Denny. Thank you.