Trafford News
Hats off to Sale shop owner Felicity Emmett
11:30am Wednesday 22nd February 2012
A SHARED passion for fashion has resulted in three generations of the same family working together in a Sale shop.
Felicity Hat Hire was established in Southport in 1988 by 82-year-old Felicity Emmett.
It is now a booming franchise with 30 stores nationally, including in London and Liverpool.
The Sale branch, on Cross Street, opened 15 years ago and is now run by Felicity’s daughter-in-law Niamh Draper.
Joining Niamh on Satudays and during school holidays are her three daughters, and Felicity’s granddaughters, Lauren, Kelly and Amy, aged 15, 14 and 13.
Niamh, aged 39, said: “The girls love coming and helping and it has given Felicity a new lease of life. We’re a really close knit family.”
Niamh, married to Felicity’s son Jeff, is currently in talks to get replicas of three hats featured in hit series Downton Abbey by the original milliners. She will find out if she has been successful in the coming month.
Milliners Figi agreed to copy one they made for Kate Winslet in movie smash Titanic in the 1990s while Herald and Heart recreated one made for Andie MacDowell in hit film Four Weddings And A Funeral.
Meanwhile, Karen Heppleston-Winn, who is from Sale, was pictured in Messenger last month wearing a Felicity hat to collect her MBE for her services to helping those with learning disabilities.
Felicity, who grew up in Northern Ireland, modelled hats for the Belfast Gazette when she was 15-years-old.
She moved to Liverpool in the 1940s and got a job in a clothes shop before taking a punt, aged 58, and investing the few savings she had starting up her hat hire business.
After that the business grew, with plans afoot to expand abroad.
Jeff, a chartered accountant, oversees the franchise on a daily basis.
Felicity trained Niamh in the Southport shop and her protegee went on to start up the Preston franchise.
The boutique has since been sold to another franchisee, with Niamh taking over the Sale shop in January.
The original Southport store has also changed hands but Felicity is still very much involved, working for free on Saturdays.
Niamh added: “She helps out whenever she can and comes to Sale a few times each week. She won’t ever retire, she loves it too much.”
Niamh is now looking forward to the racing season, along with all the wedding and garden parties summer has to bring.
Highlights for her include Aintree, Chester and Royal Ascot.
She said: “Coleen Rooney always goes to Aintree without a hat and I would love to select one for her, Samantha Cameron too.
“In my opinion Victoria Beckham always looks lovely when she wears one.”
Future plans for Niamh include organising a hat making competition for tots at Sale’s Busy Bees Nursery, on Glebelands Road.
She added: “Just imagine if we found the next great British milliner? Think how amazing that would be!”