A visit to millinery designer William Chambers’ studio in Glasgow

During my recent visit to Glasgow, as part of the People Make Glasgow campaign, I was taken around to visit some of the local designers in the area. One of them was William Chambers who has a BA First Class Hons degree in Textile Design and studied millinery at Glasgow’s Metropolitan University. He set up his own millinery label after finishing his studies. His first big break came when Irish singer-songwriter Roisin Murphy wore one of his pieces to on several dates of the singer’s European tour which led to a widespread publicity.

It’s not very often that I find myself in awe but I was certainly in awe looking at William’s hats from his spring and summer 2014 collection. Unsurprisingly we learnt that the Royal Ascot season is his busiest time of the year, when demands for his hats are enormous. In 2008 he won the UK-wide Creative 30 competition which is a project set up to discover the UK’s most talented creative young people.

We couldn’t resist trying them on and having a play – it would have been wrong not to! I was quite amazed by how a single hat can really transform your appearance – each and every lady looked outstanding in every hat they tried on inside William’s studio. It was a real pleasure to visit him right inside his working environment and look at the results of his natural creative talent.