![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2018\/06\/fashion.jpg\")
<\/p>\nWe were treated to gorgeous sunshine at Hambleton Hall in May, and what a beautiful setting to showcase some truly extraordinary hats!<\/p>\n
Rebecca works from her studio in Oakham Enterprise Park, the commercial warren just outside of the town itself. When you walk into her studio you\u2019ll find yourself stood amongst some of the world\u2019s finest millinery, all sorts of interesting hats and fascinators of different shapes and sizes. Rebecca and her husband Patrick moved to Rutland ten years ago after his parents moved to the area. They live in Oakham together with their two children, Patrick and Harry who sound like they\u2019re going to be martial art masters! Back to the business of hats, let\u2019s start from the beginning.<\/p>\n
Quite fascinatingly, Rebecca is actually self taught at this fine art. \u201cMy mother goes to a lot of race days, in fact she\u2019d wear hats to Tesco if she could,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
\u201cWanting a different outfit for each meeting was starting to get expensive so I thought I\u2019d have a go at making her a hat.\u201d These first few attempts turned out well and Rebecca had seemingly found herself a new hobby.<\/p>\n
\u201cI shared some photos on social media and then friends and family started to get in touch wanting a hat,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Things spiralled, as they usually do when someone has a talent and before long a shop in Newmarket was getting in touch with Rebecca asking to buy her hats for trade.<\/p>\n
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\u201cI was working as well at this point, it was just a hobby and all of my time was starting to be taken up sourcing materials off the internet for the hats,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
In those early days, Rebecca was seeking inspiration from well-known milliner Philip Treacy, \u201cI love his work and have always looked up to him,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
These days, you\u2019ll find Rebecca Couture Millinery alongside Philip Treacy hats in boutiques… and recently, she was featured in Tatler magazine!<\/p>\n
It was in August 2015, a couple of years after Rebecca had made that hat for her Mum, she launched her first collection and since then there have been two collections every year for Rebecca Couture Millinery.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe business has just gone from strength to strength, I moved into the Enterprise Park in 2016,\u201d says Rebecca. \u201cDue to the increase in business in Autumn 2016 I employed Lyndsey who helps to look after the sales, marketing and website and also helps to make to the hats.\u201d<\/p>\n
The enterprise park is a development of a prison! \u201cThe security is great,\u201d jokes Rebecca. \u201cIt\u2019s open 24\/7 and so I can work whenever I like, sometimes it\u2019s great just to get that alone time and be amongst my creations late at night.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2018\/06\/IMG_3004.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
The former category C prison was damaged in a riot in April 2009 and was closed in March 2011 by the government.<\/p>\n
The prison held more than 600 inmates but was never fully operational after the massive 19-hour riot, during which some blocks were damaged by fire.<\/p>\n
The 10-hectare site has 25 buildings including residential blocks, workshops, a reception, sports pitches and a gym. It\u2019s a lovely community as Oakham Enterprise Park, there\u2019s a caf\u00e9, fitness classes and all sorts of different businesses within the blocks of studios.<\/p>\n
With so many people working alongside each other at their passions in life, there seemed to be a great sense of camaraderie about the place. It\u2019s great to see such a positive result from quite a bad accident.<\/p>\n
Rebecca enjoys a day at the racing herself and you\u2019ll often find her at the likes of Ascot, Newmarket and Glorious Goodwood.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was asked to judge The Best Dressed at Leicester last year, I love getting involved with things like that,\u201d she says. As for awards herself, Rebecca won Best Hat at York races, Galway races and was a finalist at Aintree, she also won Best Hat at Ripon last year!<\/p>\n
This season, Rebecca says blush colours seem to be back in and while fascinators are still really popular, more people are starting to wear hats again.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople are toning it down as you\u2019ll have seen at The Royal Wedding, making things more elegant again,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Although, sometimes there is no stopping people and the most peculiar request that Rebecca has completed so far in her millinery career was making a dartboard hat for Ascot.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a really whacky hat,\u201d she says. \u201cAnd extremely hard to make but I was really excited to see the finished product together with the outfit.\u201d Other high points have included creating a bespoke hat for Rebecca Vardy just after Jamie Vardy had won the Premier League!<\/p>\n What Rebecca offers is a private service where you can either call in on Monday, Tuesday or Thursday, anytime between 9:30 and 12:30 and have a natter, have a try on and leave with some inspiration. Appointments can also be made for alternative days and times to suit.<\/p>\n You\u2019re under no obligation to buy anything and if you choose to have a bespoke hat,<\/p>\n Rebecca can dye material so that it\u2019s an exact match to your dress.<\/p>\n \u201cI just love seeing the happiness on people\u2019s face when their outfit comes together,\u201d says Rebecca. I should also add that when people say they don\u2019t suit hats it\u2019s ridiculous, there are so many different types, you just need to find the right one!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" High summer means weddings, garden parties, civic functions and perhaps a day at the races… so to ensure you\u2019re properly…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":233,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"acf":[],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=228"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":234,"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228\/revisions\/234"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland-and-stamford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Rebecca](\"http:\/\/www.pridemagazines.co.uk\/rutland\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2018\/06\/IMG_3162.jpg\")