ONELIFE #35 – American English

BORN NETWORK
U N B R I D L E D
P A S S I O N
A desire to innovate and change the way we live unites members of BORN, a diverse global
collective of like-minded designers and creative entrepreneurs. In the first of a series of
interviews with members of the network, Onelife caught up with equestrian fashion designer
Mia Suki to explore what connects beautiful products and the people who love them
WORDS
C H R I S S T O K E L - W A L K E R
Like many creative entrepreneurs, dissatisfaction drove Mia Suki
to start up her own business. “I was frustrated with existing
products on the market as I couldn’t really solve the problems that
I was facing at the time,” she explains from her home in Austria,
where she, her Range Rover-obsessed husband and two children
spend half their year.
An avid horse rider, Suki (who spends the other half of her year
in Hong Kong) had become fed up that some of her equestrian
clothes would wear out after only a few washes. The silicon on the
knees and seat of her riding breeches – supposedly a modern,
technologically advanced replacement for the traditional, costly
leather that had been used for years – would fade and tear after a
small amount of use. “With new technology, a different application
can become a problem,” she points out.
It wasn’t the first time that Mia Suki had endured this sense
of exasperation, as she’d had the same experience when she first
became a mother. Wandering the aisles of mother and baby
departments in various shops, she recalls being bombarded with
products, clothes, books and gadgets that were meant to make
her transition into new motherhood easier. Instead, she felt like
they made it worse. “I almost couldn’t handle how much I had to
understand,” she says.
But then she took time out to think about it, concluding that
the more innovations were rushed to market, seemingly the more
problems they created. “Women have been mothers since day one,
and never needed all this stuff,” she explains. “I think we are now
in a situation where everybody can launch a product. Unfortunately
when the craftsmanship and manufacturing are not good enough,
it’s not a long-term solution.”
Right: Mia Suki is a keen horsewoman
who understands the demands of the
sport. Above: the simple elegance
of Mia Suki’s designs is not just
restricted to her equestrian clothing
PASSIONATE INNOVATOR
Suki became infatuated with equestrianism after attending schools
in the United Kingdom. This passion for horse riding drove her to
channel her desire to address what she saw as sub-standard
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