Teaching Staff

Heather Mikkelsen

Institute Educational Manager

Fashion: Design, Drawing, History, Illustration and Textiles

Heather Mikkelsen Heather is currently employed as the Institute Manager and teaches part-time for the AICD. She has a strong background in fashion, education and art. She first started her journey in fashion design and completed a Dress Design Certificate from East Sydney Technical College in the late 70’s, and was featured in a number of fashion magazines, the Sun newspaper and as a finalist for the Wool Awards during her student years.

From there she stepped straight into a designing job for Karo Fashions and designed for the label Emmanuelle, in Sydney’s Surry Hills. After working in the fashion industry for several years as a designer, and then in retail management for Carla Zampatti and Country Road, she decided on a direction change and to pursue her other love – education and completed a Bachelor of Education (Art).

A move from Sydney to the Gold Coast followed and several years of teaching art at Tweed River High in northern NSW and St Michael’s College on the Gold Cost followed.

Over the years she has also worked as a freelance illustrator, a jewellery manufacturer, a private tutor and has exhibited at numerous local art shows, winning the drawing prize at the Currumbin art show in 1990.

After the birth of her son in the early 90’s, the two main focuses of her life – fashion and education, joined forces and Heather started teaching fashion design, illustration and decorative textiles at the Gold Coast Institute of TAFE. After 8 years she was recruited to run the Fashion Department at KvB Institute of Technology that operated out Bond University. She continued working part-time for the Gold Coast TAFE until joining the AICD team full time in late 2007.

Heather has experience in writing a number of accredited courses, setting up and establishing registered training organisations and developing training and assessment programmes for the AICD. As well as qualifications in Dress Design and Art Education, she holds qualifications in Vocational Training as well as a Diploma of E-Learning and has introduced blended learning into the AICD.

Heather is an active member of the art and decorative textiles community and has been a member of The Australian Forum for Textile Arts for many years, and has attended many of their forums over the last 10 years, strongly believing that the learning never stops. She is an enthusiastic teacher with a passion for quality training and brings warmth and compassion to her various roles at the AICD.

Christine O'Toole

Fashion: Sewing, Patternmaking, Design and Drawing

Staff information coming soon.

Leina Broughton

Fashion: Sewing and Patternmaking

Staff information coming soon.

http://www.leinabroughton.com.au/

Thuy Nguyen

Fashion: Sewing, Patternmaking and Production

Staff information coming soon.

http://tweecouture.com/

Sarah Olding

Fashion: Design, Drawing and Graphics

Staff information coming soon.

Lorraine DiBiasio

Fashion: Textiles, Production, Sewing, Patternmaking, Business and Computers

photo coming soon Lorraine has worked in the Australian Fashion Industry for over 20 years for many well known companies in the capacity as head designer, design room manager, senior pattern maker and grader (both manually & on computer), senior technical adviser & trainer, production coordinator, developer garment technologist working in China and as a bridal & evening gowns draper.

Having also had her own fashion label & retail stores she has gained a great deal of knowledge in buying and developing a label to meet market needs.

Lorraine has worked for Dolina Australia in the capacity of head designer, pattern maker and design manager over a 17 year period while also working for other Australian design companies. Over the 17 years Lorraine has worked for Dolina the company grew from a total staff of 6 to a company employing 260 staff with a multi-million dollar turnover.

The company became a leader in the middle market of ladies clothing, selling to major department stores such as David Jones and Myers and becoming developers for budget range stores producing large volumes of product such as Target, Kmart, Rockmans, Katies, Noni B and Hiltons and maintaining the companies market leadership with labels such as Citi, Dusk, Kamico and Aero. In her position with Dolina Australia Lorrain travelled to the USA, Europe, England and China every 4 months sourcing and searching for inspiration.

Lorraine worked as a designer and computer-aided pattern maker on contract for Mr K, a well known evening wear label selling to retail outlets such as Harts and Myers.

Lorraine worked for Monti Australia for nearly two years as head designer for their sportswear division, working directly with factories in China and travelling to China regularly to source fabrics and accessories directly in Shanghai, Wuxi, Suzhio, Ghangzhoi and Hong Kong.

Working with Lisa Ho as the Design Manager and over seeing all the design assistants, pattern makers, computer operators, machinists and cutters Lorraine was responsible for making sure all garments were designed and made to the design specifications for the showings of the new seasons collections and photoshoots for magazines and advertising. During her time working for Lisa Ho Lorraine designed and fitted gowns for celebrities such as Kate Richie, Sophie Monk, Lara Bingle, Delta Goodrem and Danni Minogue to wear to special events and awards nights.

Lorraine was also responsible for working directly with knitting mills in China, creating all true knit wear garment specifications for production.

Her most resent position was as a design & product developer and off-shore garment technologist working for the Webster Holdings group whom owned the Retail stores such as Jigsaw, David Lawrence, Marcs and Peter Morrissy. Her duties were to work directly with their factories in Shanghai, creating garments designs and specifications for samples and production to be completed in China to supply 154 stores throughout Australia.

Lorraine’s extensive experience in the industry allows her to provide students with valuable insights into working in the Australian fashion industry and dealing with off-shore production.

Kerry Adams

Fashion: Sewing, Patternmaking, Production and Business

Staff information coming soon.

Paula Anderson

Fashion: Design, Drawing/Illustration and Computers

Staff information coming soon.

Luda Hoffman

Fashion: Sewing

Staff information coming soon.

Gillian Marriage

Fashion: Swimwear and Stretchwear Sewing and Patternmaking

Staff information coming soon.

http://www.riotswimwear.com.au/

Maree Rissman

Beauty: Anatomy & Physiology, Massage, Spa Treatments

Staff information coming soon.

Kady Chittleborough

Beauty: Facials, Waxing & Tinting, Nails, Makeup

Staff information coming soon.

Kirsty Norton

Makeup & Fashion Business

Staff information coming soon.

Rebecca Veale

Makeup

Rebecca Veale Rebecca (Beck) Veale is a qualified hairdresser and makeup artist with over ten years experience in the industry. Originally trained as a hairdresser in Melbourne, Beck has had 3 years of international travel following her profession. Beck has worked with the likes of Angelina Jolie, Kate Hudson and Oprah Winfreys makeup artists learning all the high profile tips and tricks in makeup artistry. She has worked on numerous events, videos and with celebrities. Some of these include Mercedes Fashion Week, Melbourne Spring Racing Carnival, numerous events for the Starlight Foundation Royal Childrens Hospital Melbourne, Lavinia Nixon, Shihad, Emma Hewitt, Mahalia Barnes, Toni Pearen and many more. Beck's passion and dedication to makeup and hair stying is evident in her teaching and she strives to give her students the knowledge and skills to be a top stylist in the growing industry.