Australian Dress Register

Margaret English Clarke was born in Southampton, UK on 9th January 1939. With her parents, Phyllis and James, and little sister Mary, the family migrated to Perth in November 1946. Clarko, as she soon become known, attended Presbyterian Ladies’ College from 1946 until 1956. After leaving school, she attended Business College.

In 1960 she married Michael Herzfeld at Guildford Grammar School chapel. After he graduated as a civil engineer, they worked in Northam for two years where their first child was born, then Derby where their second child was born. They moved to Claremont in 1969 where their third child was born. The family continues to live in the nearby suburbs.

Margaret died in 2005.

You are 24 years old, married to a civil engineer and living in the Kimberley in the north-west of Western Australia. You have a baby and a toddler, the dreaded “two under two” and want to dress them in something other than the limited choices available. So you learn smocking from a “Semco” magazine. (Semco, an Australian company specialising in embroidery fabrics, threads, patterns and instruction books.)

Twenty years later, you now live in Perth; your three children have grown up; you have studied smocking to the high standard expected from the Embroiderers’ Guild (UK), and smocking is fashionable again. What do you do?

Well, Margaret used her considerable talents to teach in Western Australia and interstate, designed original garments for “Australian Smocking and Embroidery" magazine and established a business making smocked garments for many Perth children until illness cut her life short in 2005.

Between 1990 and 2003, Margaret’s designs appeared in twenty one issues of “Australian Smocking and Embroidery” magazine.  Two of these outfits made the front cover, and one was voted as one of the “Great Smocking Designs of Australia”. For each of these issues, a photo shoot took place in Adelaide: garments and the detailed instructions had to be ready well ahead of the publication date. Correspondence confirms that Margaret was always well prepared and that her instructions were easy to follow.

Mind you, in her teaching, she had a neat line to ensure students returned for further classes, by only giving information sufficient for the day, and inviting them to come along to the next class. Historically, smocks were worn by trades people, with the smocked pattern showing the symbols of their trade or craft. Margaret taught, wearing a smock of her own design, which incorporated the tools of her trade in the embroidery.

Margaret’s dresses won prizes in Australia, the UK and the USA. Her year book records that in one year she worked 408 smocked garments.

Margaret's smocking designs became a recognizable icon for quality children's wear throughout Australia in the 1990s. She was a person who valued history. She researched smocks and smocking techniques in the United Kingdom and became an authority on the smocks that had travelled to Australia and were later included in local and national museums. No doubt a definitive guide to historic smocks in Australia would have been forthcoming had she lived longer.

This garment, along with several others, was designed and made for publication in the magazine " Australian Smocking and Embroidery". The current copyright holders, "Inspirations" magazine, based in Adelaide, have given permission for the original photographs to be used.

A fine dark blue piping is inserted between the yoke and the smocking at the waist.

Plain dobby weave cotton, printed dark blue with pink strawberries and green leaves.

This romper suit is home made. The front and back have been assembled separately, then joined using an overlocker sewing machine at the side seams.

The fabric is cut on the straight.

There are four (4) buttons and buttonholes down the centre front, one button and buttonhole on each leg cuff, and four (4) buttons and buttonholes across the crotch opening.

This romper suit would be a child's everyday wear. In summer it could be worn alone, on cooler days a t-shirt or jumper could be worn underneath.

You are 24 years old, married to a civil engineer and living in the Kimberley in the north-west of Western Australia. You have a baby and a toddler, the dreaded “two under two” and want to dress them in something other than the limited choices available. So you learn smocking from a “Semco” magazine. (Semco, an Australian company specialising in embroidery fabrics, threads, patterns and instruction books.)

Twenty years later, you now live in Perth; your three children have grown up; you have studied smocking to the high standard expected from the Embroiderers’ Guild (UK), and smocking is fashionable again. What do you do?

Well, Margaret used her considerable talents to teach in Western Australia and interstate, designed original garments for “Australian Smocking and Embroidery" magazine and established a business making smocked garments for many Perth children until illness cut her life short in 2005.

Between 1990 and 2003, Margaret’s designs appeared in twenty one issues of “Australian Smocking and Embroidery” magazine.  Two of these outfits made the front cover, and one was voted as one of the “Great Smocking Designs of Australia”. For each of these issues, a photo shoot took place in Adelaide: garments and the detailed instructions had to be ready well ahead of the publication date. Correspondence confirms that Margaret was always well prepared and that her instructions were easy to follow.

Mind you, in her teaching, she had a neat line to ensure students returned for further classes, by only giving information sufficient for the day, and inviting them to come along to the next class. Historically, smocks were worn by trades people, with the smocked pattern showing the symbols of their trade or craft. Margaret taught, wearing a smock of her own design, which incorporated the tools of her trade in the embroidery.

Margaret’s dresses won prizes in Australia, the UK and the USA. Her year book records that in one year she worked 408 smocked garments.

Margaret's smocking designs became a recognizable icon for quality children's wear throughout Australia in the 1990s. She was a person who valued history. She researched smocks and smocking techniques in the United Kingdom and became an authority on the smocks that had travelled to Australia and were later included in local and national museums. No doubt a definitive guide to historic smocks in Australia would have been forthcoming had she lived longer.