Advised against launching with a large collection, it was in the second week of January 2011 that I briefed my superb Australian pattern cutter on a limited range of about 10 garments. We intend to produce garments to couture quality for our demographic. London Fashion Week getting in the way, it was at the beginning of March that we had our first fitting. A revelation, great to see some product at last however this also revealed my less than perfect skill at briefing and my lack of empathy with jersey as a fabric. We reduced the number of designs and divided production into two phases.

The choice of fabrics loomed, a huge hurdle to overcome. I desperately need more education around the subject. So I enrolled on a course to be held in September by the London College of Fashion. This will culminate in a visit to Premiere Vision, a leading fabrics fair in Paris, however September is a long way off. More immediately there was to be a fair held here in London, Textile Forum on South Moulton Lane. I had been assured  it was accessible, I was doubtful knowing the age of the building fabric in the area. Sure enough I was unable to get onto the pavement let alone the two steps up to the front door or the flight of stairs to the fair on the first floor. A stair lift had been provided, but as I am unable to stand and the man with the key was unavailable, two gallant, strong men carried me sitting in my electric wheelchair all the way up and later down, I would love to thank them. By attending this small fair I started in a tiny way to unravel the puzzle of where to source fabrics in this country. I emerged inspired by the fabrics I had seen this inspiration built on by visiting Selfridge’s the same day by seeing the fabric used by Design House of Stockholm.  A great day.

We recut the patterns and toiled again. S/S 2011 was slipping away. We held our second fitting in the middle of April. Based on this fitting I finally jumped, buying fabrics and trimmings, organising dyeing for some, washing to prevent shrinkage and ironing for others. I had another invigorating day when the label sample arrived.

Today I sit here awaiting the third toile to allow me finally to let slip the sample machinists of war. After that it’s organising styling, modelling and photography before installing on a finished website.

Before that there is a lot of work still to do what with loading content onto the web skeleton, sourcing delivery options, registering for VAT purposes, working out the categories of garment which should be zero rated for tax purposes, sourcing packaging and ordering the wash care instructions. These are just the known unknowns I’m sure there are many more unknown unknowns. (Shakespeare was okay but I never, never thought I’d quote this man)

Choosing to reflect it seems to me that there are more positive than negative aspects that linger. I treasure the inspiration I have found, and apart from resolving never to go there again I do find that I have lost my appetite for food. I have hardly any interest in eating which does take away one of life’s great pleasures. I can live with that, but I do now empathise with people to whom the very sight of food turns their stomach. The thrice weekly visits of my two feisty carers, an extraordinarily ugly stairlift clogging up our hall and the weekly visits of the wonderful district nursing service team seem to be the only visible reminders of that horrible 2009.

However I do now find myself the immensely proud owner of a company, XENI planning to design, manufacture and retail online clothing for women who use wheelchairs and for women who have problems manipulating buttons and zips. I also now plan to retail jewellery for women who have problems manipulating those fiddly clasps on jewellery, without however, finding anybody to take on this task.

All in all this is a happy interim report ………     …. but what does fate plan next

As it always does, the time did inexorably pass. On the appointed evening I presented myself at the entrance to CSM to be confronted as I had had a sneaking suspicion I would be with a rather lovely set of steps up to the entrance. Some beautiful architectural students called one of the porters who had to take me around three sides of the building, and up a ramp in the delivery area to gain access. That was the last time my class went to Southampton Row we all needed to decamp, it felt like being banished, to Back Hill to ensure my safety in case of a fire. If they were aware of my role in the banishment the students on my course were gracious enough never to mention it. (This situation I am sure will be resolved after September in CSM‘s new building at King’s Cross). The students here were just as beautiful and as interesting as they had been at Southampton Row.

I found that first class a revelation. Lynette our lecturer asked everyone to introduce themselves telling us all where they came from and what they were planning. The girl to my right came from Latvia the girl to my left Dubai we went round the table Brazil, Mexico, South Africa, Austria, finishing off with India and France. Out of 16 four of us were from Britain I from South Africa, Kemi, Nigeria and two lovely girls of Russian parentage. The choice of Xeni as a name seemed more and more appropriate. The ambition around the table was palpable. What a great way to greet the economic downturn looming.

The course continued but in parallel the business demanded attention. As seems to have happened over the life of the project the ducks seem to have an unexpected habit of lining up when needed. The partner of a friend’s son was planning to start up as a graphic designer on her own.

Letty did an absolutely first-class job first establishing font and case and then doing the business card, letterhead and look of the website.

To ensure that I got what I was hoping for in my website I asked Paul Smith of Alpha Analytics to draw up a specification.

In early December alerted by friends I heard a programme on Woman’s Hour BBC 4 regarding the lack of availability of appropriate clothing for disabled people. It felt like fate really was on our side.

It was thus at the beginning of 2011 that I found myself, website specification and graphics in hand standing on the edge of the abyss. In this economic climate there seemed to be no funding to be had for start-up enterprises. Funds would have to come from either borrowing which would have to be at a fairly high rate of interest secured against our house, which we are finally close to paying off, or by releasing funds saved for our retirement. My husband, engaged in the daily rat race and having the expense and responsibility for my care, found this a more than daunting prospect, one huge bet in which you must be prepared to lose all. I was undermining all our hard-won saving for our retirement.

An architect in my previous life, I have always worked in the private sector and have very enjoyably specialised in the design of laboratories. No final salary pension schemes here. I faced up to the stark reality, action was essential. It was time to embark on a new venture. The economic situation may be dreadful for many people but having a real project made me feel able to plot a way ahead, far better doing this than sudoku an activity for which I show no aptitude. If I was to be fortunate I may also be in a position to be able to help others by providing employment opportunities in what I hoped would be a stable business with an expanding future. In the rush of generative enthusiasm I committed myself, telling whoever would listen. I had difficulty understanding that not everyone thought it as good an idea as I did. People around me wrote it off thinking it to be a reaction to the depression I had recently suffered. But I was serious.

It was now April 2010. My daughter had recently returned from teaching English in China with the British Council having previously graduated from St Andrews University with a good degree in mediaeval history. She was now applying for her first job in this unforgiving job market. We all know what is going on in the jobs market, particularly for recent graduates. I was desperately worried for her especially since it is in an area of work foreign to me, where the generation of reward was not related to making product. The more worried I became the more I could put my head down and work solidly. This had the effect of reducing the inevitable tensions of the horrible job application period. It also moved my project on apace.

Initially, I had thought that I would employ a fashion designer, but a great friend, who so fortunately happens to be the head of fashion at Middlesex University, suggested I design the range myself, daunting but simultaneously empowering. She also put me in contact with a lovely production manager, who proposed manufacturing the clothing to order in London. We were now planning to design and manufacture in London, then retail online. The business plan was starting to flesh itself out.

Another peculiar coincidence then occurred along what by now seemed to be a fated road. A friend visiting Queens Crescent library picked up a catalogue, Hot Courses listing all the adult education courses offered in London and passed it on.  Thinking I was too busy to be having anything to do with taking any courses I ignored it. But late on Friday afternoon flipping through I looked at fashion courses in a desultory way and there rivetingly listed stood a course to be held at Central St Martins (CSM) entitled How to Start Your Own Fashion Label, It was by now too late to phone to book. The next day we left to take our first holiday for at least two years, all holidays having been impossible over the seemingly endless period of depression. At 7 AM from St Pancras the following day we were whisked straight to Avignon in six hours. It was absolutely amazing. So it was in the hills around Isle sur la Sourge on Monday morning that I was able to phone CSM. I felt I needed to phone to make them aware that I used a wheelchair and was told that there would be no problem all the facilities were accessible. I was a little doubtful knowing from its style that the building was built early in the 20th century on Southampton Row, but time would tell.

It was the end of July, the course started in October, everything was on hold, I was champing at the bit. So it was on Friday, 13 August 2010 that I started my company XENI using an online company formation site Companies Made Simple.

Desi my closest friend is Greek. Xeni means outsider and is the Greek root for xenophobe but similarly also for xenophile. My production manager and I are both foreigners in this country bringing our disparate skills together to hopefully create wealth both for ourselves and this country which has taken us in and has itself shown us no xenophobia. South African, German, we were soon to be joined by a Turk and an Australian and I’m sure will be by many other immigrants as well as indigents in the future. I could even possibly pay off a debt for my education to South Africa by outsourcing the manufacture there.

A surprise.

I am writing this blog to log my progress, hopefully back to health and beyond. It could be called a story of retail therapy. I will start by telling how it all started.

Life was going along fine. Well in 1990 my MS had been diagnosed and by now I needed a wheelchair to get around. But hey I was cool about that. I had stopped work suffering from fatigue and I spent a good proportion of my time resting or asleep. I was cool about that too.

Then, in 2009 after a number of successive infections (a common complaint of catheter users) depression’s black dog jumped up and knocked me flying.

Beloved friends and relations gathered round, but they could only come to observe the wreckage. In the face of not being able to contemplate living let alone eating again, they doggedly continued to visit bringing me the only comestible I took any pleasure in eating, the luscious cherries of that season. They were amazingly bravely prepared to face the emotional rigours of the debilitating institution in which I found myself. My dear husbands sixtieth birthday went entirely unmarked in the fog of despair.

It was a long and dreary road back but I unexpectedly found myself mid-somersault. I had an idea about how to design a dress that I could put on independently. My consultan to t had prescribed a course of little yellow pills mirtazapine. I started to think creatively again. I would use my disabilities both of needing to use a wheelchair and having difficulty with fine motor control of my hands to my advantage. I knew what I could do. I would sell online fashionable clothing for women who use wheelchairs and women who have difficulty manipulating buttons and zips.

In November 2009 I asked my sister who lives in America to make a dress to my design for me and heard nothing. My consultant asked me, was I too happy, did I find myself spending money excessively? Well, this is a great way to spend large quantities of money. Was this just an underhand way of maintaining my spendthrift ways into retirement? But if not now, when? My hands were becoming more affected and the effects of the disease would only worsen. The only constant in my life seemed to be the debilitating progress of the disease. The way forward is to ignore it.

In March 2010 my sister visited bringing the dress I’d asked her to make. It felt as though the whole idea was surging on.