‘Innovative in every sense’: Perri Cutten remembered as a trailblazer

For those who knew her, Perri Cutten was so much more than the mainstay of women’s wardrobes for more than four decades — she was a visionary with many talents and a friend who “never stopped giving”.

Perri Cutten has been remembered this week as a trailblazing fashion designer who was a cut above the rest.

For those who knew her, Cutten was so much more than the mainstay of women’s wardrobes for more than 40 years.

She was an innovator who brought women into the workforce in style, a visionary alongside her long-time partner and photographer Jo Daniell who remembers her as a multifaceted woman he adored.

Fashion designer Perri Cutten. Picture: Supplied

“There were so many aspects to her life,” Daniell told the Saturday Herald Sun.

“She was innovative in every sense, in fashion but also in so much more.”

Her sense of style and beauty was reflected in the magnificent garden surrounding the Mornington Peninsula home the couple shared.

A reminiscing Daniell said she knew every garden variety by its Latin name. “She had a memory like a steeltrap, having been taught from an early age by her nurseryman father.”

Cutten relinquished her role as creative director from her eponymous label in the early 2000s and was most happy working with Daniell in the soil of their classically proportioned labour of love at their coastal retreat.

Perri Cutten in Carlton in 1991.

Looking at their garden at Flinders is how Daniell remembers Cutten best. Another close comfort is their beloved border collie, Buddy, in the week since she died last Friday from breast cancer.

“Buddy is giving me a lot of solace. She named him partly because she just thought it was a sweet name and because I’m a Sydney Swan supporter,” Daniell said.

He said Cutten was surrounded by love in her final moments, with her two daughters Gabrielle and Katherine by her side.

She was also the beloved stepmother of Daniell’s daughters Lily and Coco. “I’m so grateful it was peaceful, I was able to be with her.

“She knew she was sick but she didn’t know death was imminent,” Daniell said. “Again, I’m grateful for that.”

Having celebrated their 31st anniversary together last week, their love was entwined like the deep roots of their garden.

Perri Cutten and Jo Daniell in 1995.

Cutten with Country Road owner Stephen Bennett.

“She named her youngest daughter, Gabrielle, after the fashion designer Coco Chanel, just like my daughter Coco,” Daniell said.

Daniell, an award-winning photographer, met Cutten when shooting a feature on emerging women of style, photographing Cutten in a St Kilda apartment.

“She was invited out to dinner that night and met the man she later married,” Daniell smiles. “And then exactly 10 years to the day, two very close friends of both mine and hers arranged a blind date.

“She said, ‘I’m not going to sit with a man I don’t know.’

“Anyway, she did. And one thing led to another.”

Perri Cutten in 1990.

The two would later travel the world, from Antarctica to the Arctic.

“We both love Norway. There were all sorts of experiences, Iceland, Greenland. I spent a lot of time in Africa, especially as a photographer and it was the one place I could never persuade her to go. I think she was just a bit nervous about being eaten by a lion.”

Cutten's Fashions Show at David Jones in 1996.

Daniel said Cutten’s philanthropic work behind the scenes, working with charities supporting cerebral palsy, to being vice president for the National Gallery of Victoria’s women’s association was very important to her.

“They would raise about $150,000 a year at least, buying pictures for the National Gallery. We also supported the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra.

“We put on a lunch at our place at Flinders once for 150 people. We had the choir singing there, it was a lovely event.”

Cutten was very hands on with everything she did.

A Melbourne graphic design graduate, she first cut her cloth working at legendary Flinders Lane brands Geoff Bade and Thomas Wardle, where her contemporaries were Teena Varigos and Ojay’s Harry Goles.

Cutten would speak of seeing a gap in the market for smart professional women who wanted to dress sharply as they entered the corporate world.

Barbie wears Perri Cutten gown and Ken wears an Yves Saint Laurent suit in 1996.

Opening a store in the heartland of Armadale on High St in 1981, with a dedication to “good fabrics, good taste and always flattering”, Cutten’s timeless designs have never gone out of fashion.

The brand collected accolades including four awards from the Fashion Industries of Australia and a Woolmark Award for Excellence. In 1998, Swinburne University, where Cutten studied graphic design, awarded her an honorary doctorate.

The Austin Group, which acquired the brand, said Cutten’s name had become “synonymous with timeless elegance and sophistication.

“She built a legacy that has endured for decades, dressing generations of Australian women with style, grace and confidence,” group director Georgina Austin said.

“Her contribution to the fashion industry was not only visionary but also deeply personal. She understood the modern Australian woman and designed with purpose, integrity, and grace.”

Perri Cutten’s ‘influence can still be seen at Flemington to this day’. Picture: David Caird

Her designs, from sharp tailored suiting, sophisticated wool coats, flowing feminine dresses to bold printed silk blouses that flattered each and every body shape, have long been a standout winner at the Flemington racecourse, especially inside the famed members stand.

“A true icon of Australian fashion. Her influence can still be seen at Flemington to this day as racegoers continue to embrace the timeless elegance synonymous with Perri’s designs,” Victoria Racing Club CEO Kylie Rogers said.

Emme Aronson in a Perri Cutten jacket in 1995.

Daniell says there has been an outpouring of tributes and support, with a public memorial to be held for the woman he loved next month.

“She was 76 actually, she would have been chuffed that all the stories had her at 73,” he laughs.

But for now Daniell and Buddy will take time together in their Flinders retreat. Their magnificent garden, which Daniell said Cutten created on “the back of an envelope” with architect and friend Alan Powell and later working with the renowned garden designer Julian Ronchi, has featured in TV shows and in the pages of Vogue magazine.

Another recently departed fashion designer, Maggie Tabberer, is remembered in the heady scent of a rose. “She once stayed and gave us the flower that had been named in her honour. It is fabulous, white and never stops giving, just like her,” Cutten once said of her designer friend.

Daniel said Cutten “was a plantsman, not just a gardener.

“She loved entertaining and loved putting on a show. So there’s yet enough facet of her character. She was also a fabulous cook who hated cooking the same dish twice.”

Perri Cutten was a woman for all seasons.

Originally published as ‘Innovative in every sense’: Perri Cutten remembered as a trailblazer