Designer Carla Zampatti banks on Westpac chic to bounce

Carla Zampatti is facing one of the biggest challenges of her career: designing Westpac’s new uniforms.

L to R..Rodalyn Brookes, Mitchell McClennan, Carla Zampatti fashion designer, Michael Halls and Jason Yetton, group executive, retail and business banking, Westpac. Story is about Westpac's new corporate wardrobe/ uniform. Zampatti is a long time Westpac customer and is designing the new uniform.

After 50 years in business, fashion designer Carla Zampatti is facing one of the biggest challenges of her career — designing new ­corporate clothing for more than 10,000 Westpac bankers.

While final details await the approval of Westpac staff, Zampatti unveiled sketches of her proposed new designs at Westpac’s Sydney headquarters this week.

If she gets her way, the old black suit, white shirt and red tie will go out the window, and be replaced with smart navy suits for men and women, a possible choice of nine different blouses for women, shirts and skirts with smart blue-and-white stripes, dresses in plain blue, blue-and- white stripes or silver grey print, and silk scarfs and ties.

Italian-born Zampatti arrived in Australia as a young girl in 1950 and produced her first fashion collection in 1965, going on to ­become a national brand.

“I was in the middle of preparing to celebrate my 50th year in business when I was approached by Westpac,” says Zampatti, who has rejected several approaches in the past to design corporate ­uniforms.

“I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, can I do this?’. But Westpac have been my bankers for such a long time, I thought, why not? And I liked the brief about designing for a client which has been around for almost 200 years.”

The new range of clothing, which will provide staffers with a wide choice of mix-and-match options, won’t be known as a ­uniforms, it will be labelled the “Westpac collection”.

Zampatti’s goal is to design a clothing range that Westpac ­staffers will be enthusiastic about wearing.

“I would like to think they will be very proud of wearing it,” she said in an interview with The ­Australian. “It is about making them feel as if they are part of a forward-looking organisation.

“I would like to think you have to rip it off them because otherwise they would want to wear it to a nightclub or out to dinner,” she joked.

Zampatti described the collection, which is still in sketch form awaiting staff feedback, as “exciting with many options”.

“It is not like going to a wedding or a cocktail party,” she said. “It is about professionalism — ­enabling a professional person to feel they look fantastic while ­enabling them to get on with their job. It’s all about design, fit and the fabrics.”

In designing the new-look wardrobe, which will be trialled by some 200 staff over the next few months and formally launched in October next year, ahead of the bank’s 200th anniversary in 2017, Westpac has consulted with other large companies that have large numbers of staff.

“We spent a lot of time talking to Qantas and DBS Bank in Singapore and HSBC,” said Jason Yetton, Westpac’s group executive retail and business banking.

“One of the points that emerged was the importance of staff engagement in the process.”

Yetton said employees had ­already been surveyed about their basic requirements. The bank has about 680 branches around ­Australia, including 250 in regional and rural areas.

“In any given year our staff will talk to more than three million customers who walk into our branches or be visiting them in their business or their office or their homes, and they want to look professional,” he said.

“They want to look stylish and confident.”

Having clothing designed by a top fashion designer was also ­another staff suggestion.

“We had a longstanding relationship with Carla, who established her business over 50 years ago and like many small businesses around Australia, Westpac backed her vision,” Yetton said.

The new collection will feature a range of options, including maternity wear, looser blouses and tops for hot climates, and padded jackets and country wear for bankers visiting rural areas.

Zampatti chose navy as the main colour theme. Offsetting this will be accessories in silver grey.

Yetton said the decision had been taken not to over-use Westpac’s traditional red colour.

The collection is challenging for Zampatti who has designed women’s fashions throughout her career.

“Men’s clothing is very straight up and down,” she said. “But I have learned a lot.

“Young men of today in ­Australia are very fashion ­conscious. They are very stylish. The demographic of the bank is quite young.”