The new industry darling transforming the catwalk
‘Clothes are like armour for me. They allow you to be yourself ’
Sinéad Burke is an unlikely fashion muse. It’s not so much her height – she’s 3ft 5in, or 105.5cm (“Don’t forget the point five,” she laughs) – because fashion likes the unusual. No, it’s Burke’s measured articulacy and thrilled-to-be-here enthusiasm that distinguishes her from the jaded, jet-lagged muteness of her co-frontrowers and the must-not-smile expressions of the catwalk models.
We meet in a smart London hotel a day after the Burberry show in London. Burke has flown over from Dublin in the seat next to the actor Domhnall Gleeson and is still flying, albeit with that aforementioned parachute of perspective. She is formidably informed about the fashion industry – impressively so, since her knowledge is mainly gleaned from reading about it. More interestingly, she has opinions, many of them about how the industry could be more inclusive – which would, among other virtues, make it more efficient and profitable. Someone really should make her a CEO, or a fashion editor…
In the meantime, she’s happily up to her eyes in a PHD in human rights and education, cautiously navigating her new status of industry darling, which began when she found herself presenting a TED talk in New York in March 2017. Entitled “Why Design Should Include Everyone”, it has since been viewed 1.243 million times. Late last year, she delivered another barnstorming performance at a conference in that cradle of modern civilisation, the Cotswolds’ Soho Farmhouse, organised by businessoffashion. com (BOF), the industry’s online bible. She has since acquired a PR and is currently being wooed by various ultra-glossy magazines as a model.
Less than an hour before that TED talk, she was almost frozen by nerves. She promptly locked herself in the bathroom, looked in the mirror and gave herself a pep talk. “Sinéad, you’ve done so much to get to this point. Don’t let this nervousness get the best of you.”
Oh yes. Bathrooms. They’re an ordeal. “Can I actually reach the door to lock it?” is one question she perpetually asks. If she can’t, she looks for a bin to climb on to. If there isn’t one, she jams the lock with her iphone X – she deliberately bought the X because it’s the perfect size for this task. Her last resort is to ask a stranger to guard the door.
Her journey to the TED talk neatly encapsulates the paradigm. She found herself being whisked through the airport in a wheelchair. She doesn’t need wheels, but it’s the only way to navigate security. As for collecting her bags off the carousel… so many public places aren’t remotely designed with little people (their preferred description) in mind.
She was already installed behind a low table when I arrived. It was a while before I realised she was standing. “My legs would dangle if I actually sat on the armchair. I prefer to stand.” Which she did, for about two hours.
None of this is as exhausting as being stared and pointed at, or made the object of closet photography, which she is, on almost a daily basis. These challenges she tackles as she does the rest of her life – with good humoured, pragmatic activism. “It’s not that they don’t hurt,” she says. But righteous indignation only gets you so far. “Once, when I was at university, I rang the police and I didn’t get good service. Their reaction was, ‘are you sure it’s you they’re targeting?’ So she met with the university officer and together they mapped out an awareness policy.
For Burke it always comes back to education. She’s a born teacher, which is what she was, until the PHD – and that still takes her in and out of schools. “I’m so lucky to have supportive parents who never once questioned my ambitions.” (Her father is little, although her mother is average height. When she was seven, they set up a charity, Little People of Ireland.)
She considers herself fortunate, too, to have been in a position to facilitate children’s curiosity. I ask her how she asserted herself in a class full of boisterous 11-year-olds. “It’s not about being the biggest voice in the room. I couldn’t even hang the art in my classroom so I created a team of curators among the children, I was like Andrew Bolton [the head curator of New York’s Costume Institute]. It’s about power sharing.” She arranged the desks in a U-shape so that everyone could see her and be at her eye level when she stood. “That had an extraordinary impact.”
She’s not kidding when she says she’s determined, tenacious, articulate, creative. She organises an annual fashion show in Ireland for little people and scored her first ticket to a London fashion show by accosting Paul Costelloe, the designer, in the street in Dublin. “I literally tugged at his sleeve and word-vomited at him.”
What’s so refreshing is her knack of framing her particular requirements in the universal. She’s an animated spokesperson for anyone who feels ignored by fashion but yearns not to be. “As clichéd as it sounds, clothes are like armour for me. Finding things that fit and work for you allows you to be yourself, because you’re not having to contort yourself.”
There are between one in 15,000 and one in 40,000 people with achondroplasia in the UK. That’s a sizeable demographic surely worthy of a clothing brand’s attentions. She’s not demanding they all rush out little people collections, however. “But at least be open to the option of special orders.”
She’s always loved clothes. As a teenager she would go shopping with her three sisters and feel utterly excluded. “I had the biggest appetite for fashion of all of us, the same money, but none of the stores were interested in selling to me.” The rise of designer children’s wear is only of partial consolation. “I’m an adult,” she points out. “I’ve got breasts and, ahem, rather larger hips than I might like…” Most of the time she relies on a local, “wonderful dressmaker. She’s been altering my clothes since I was about four. But knitwear is hopeless.”
As for shoes… the problem is illustrated by the sparkly pair she was delighted to have found in a children’s size 11. “I walked into a new class to discover one of the little girls was wearing the same pair. It was hugely undermining at the time, although in retrospect the little girl probably loved it.”
Burberry made her a bespoke trench for her BOF talk. They also place a box next to her seat at their show. This is unusual thoughtfulness. Ultimately it’s not callousness but the general lack of awareness that motivates her. I tell her that at the beginning of our meeting, I didn’t know how to greet her and it made me nervous. Is stooping patronising?
It turns out she’s not bothered. She has acquaintances who are “like 6ft 8in and they practically lie on the floor” to talk to her. All she wants is an interesting conversation – particularly with the fashion industry. Unfortunately the industry doesn’t have a great track record of staying focused on its pet issues for more than a season or two.
“I think we all need to be challenged because we are biased in some capacity, from your race to ethnicity to disability or non-disability, and instead of shutting down when we’re challenged about that, which is a really natural human thing to do, it would be great if we could take a step back and go, actually, you’re dead right.”