My lightbulb moment

By Liz Hoggard, The Daily Mail (June 2019)

Sue Timney, 68, co-founded fabric and design company Timney Fowler in 1980. Divorced, she lives in Deal, Kent, and has four children.

I married at 18 and became a single mother when my daughter was not yet two. I’d studied sculpture with printmaking at art college, but no one believed I could study for an MA and bring up my daughter. They said: ‘Oh, we’ve never had a single woman here with a baby. How would you manage?’ I was furious.

But Edinburgh University accepted me on its MA — the course leader was a single mother, too — and later I studied at the Royal College of Art (RCA) for a second MA. On graduating, I was awarded a travelling scholarship to Japan.

My boyfriend, Grahame Fowler, came, too. We were flying by the seat of our pants, but we had a feel for fashion and product design. I took my drawings to a Japanese agent, who introduced us to fashion designer Issey Miyake. Issey bought virtually everything and thus began a 20-year working relationship.

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