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Dialling it down: leaders ditch Silly shirts for capes and scarfs

MICHAEL DALY

Scarfs and capes were in for the 2021 leaders meeting, with the traditional ‘‘silly shirts’’ tossed aside to accommodate the virtual nature of this year’s event.

With New Zealand the host of the Apec forum for 2021, a local company had the opportunity to provide the gift garments worn by the leaders of the 21 member economies at their forum overnight Friday into early Saturday.

The successful business was Christchurch-based Untouched World, which also provided black polo shirts, with an embroidered fern, for the 1999 Auckland Apec meeting, and gifts that were presented to leaders at a Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in New Zealand in 1995.

Apec gatherings have become well known for group pictures where the leaders wear garments presented to them by the host nation. These garments have included vicuna wool shawls in Peru, colourful long Ao Dai costumes in Vietnam, Drizabone raincoats in Australia, ponchos in Chile, and bright, intricately patterned, long-sleeved shirts in Malaysia.

But with the meeting held virtually this year because of the Covid-19 pandemic, there wasn’t any group photo from New Zealand. And because the leaders were all shown on screens and were sitting, the garments were focused on the part of the body that was seen.

Because the leaders didn’t come to New Zealand, the garments had to be sent to Apec leaders, with instructions on how they should be worn, Untouched World founder and chief executive Peri Drysdale said.

The garments are made from merino

wool from the high-country Glenthorne Station beside Lake Coleridge inland from Christchurch, and were designed and made in Christchurch.

Scarfs were made for the men, with the Apec NZ tohu (symbol) knitted into them, Drysdale said.

The women’s garment was a cape made from a fine merino fabric that had been cut and embroidered with the tohu down each side at the front.

All the ‘‘design action’’ was on the part of the garment seen on screen.

‘‘There was absolutely no point in dressing them in something that didn’t look right sitting down,’’ Drysdale said.

‘‘We also had to think about the busyness of the whole screen. The 21 members [were] there on the screen, so it had to look kind of uniform.’’

Untouched World had sent Apec NZ a range of colour selections, and the organisation had chosen a kind of greeny blue.

‘‘It just evokes New Zealand,’’ Drysdale said.

The tohu pattern is in white. The brief for the garments was very tight.

‘‘We’re proud to have created the garments, and worked with Apec NZ to refine the process to ensure the garments were totally in line with the Apec narrative.’’

Drysdale said Untouched World was very lucky to have been selected to produce the garments for both the 1999 and 2021 Apec gatherings.

The 1999 event had been great for the company’s profile, particularly because then-United States president Bill Clinton repeatedly wore his garment, and commented that it was the smartest outfit anyone had given him during his seven years as president.

The gifts produced for the CHOGM meeting included items for the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh, and on the basis of that the duke had ordered more garments.

Apec 2021

en-nz

2021-11-21T08:00:00.0000000Z

2021-11-21T08:00:00.0000000Z

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