Breaking Boundaries Fashionably

Breaking
Boundaries
Fashionable
2
SME Success Story
Breaking Boundaries Fashionably
Born into a family of dressmakers, Melinda Looi has gone from prodigal child seamstress to
international fashion designer.
Constant Innovation Key
To Success
• By Charlotte Robert
“F
ashion is my life. I was
born into the tradition of
dressmaking as my parents had a fashion company. I grew up
sewing, ironing, and basically learning everything that was involved with
it,” recalls award winning fashion
designer Melinda Looi; fashion’s answer to avant garde in Malaysia.
Having won the prestigious Designer
of the Year Award at the Malaysia
International Fashion Week for the second
time in 2006 (she won it the first time in
2004) and the Most Dynamic Designer
2003 at the Malaysian International
Fashion Week, Looi’s clients range from
socialites to working professionals, royalty
and international celebrities like Cameron
Diaz, Britney Spears and Mena Suvari.
Having said that however, Looi admits that initially she did harbour
thoughts of becoming an artist but
when that thought was shot down by
her parents as being too risky, she
attended a part-time fashion design
course at the LaSalle Fashion School
in KL instead. After all, fashion was
just art presented in a different way,
she says.
In 1995, Looi won the Malaysia
Young Designer Award, which came
with a scholarship to finish her course
in LaSalle College, Montreal, Canada.
“That was when I found out there is
so much more to fashion; its different
cultures and lifestyles. I love it. Fashion equals Art. My creation equals art
pieces.”
After returning from her studies in
Canada, Looi continued to work with
her parents for another year. In November 1999, she started her own line
under her name and in 2000, Mellooi
Creation Sdn Bhd was formed.
The early days
Looking back, Looi says: “I started
very small with a counter at Lot 10
Isetan back in 1999. I had RM5,000;
RM3,000 given by grandmother and
RM2,000 from my own savings. I
bought one sewing machine and was
only able to hire one seamstress.
Everything else I did myself. Later
I hired more staff, but up to today I
have to be very hands on.”
“Of course there were moments when
I felt things were just beyond me and
at these times I asked myself why am
I doing all this, it would be so much
easier to work for someone from 9
– 5pm and earn a steady salary,” she
recalls.
“The journey was not an easy one and
it was filled with hard work. It was
quite normal for me to work two or
three days a week till the wee hours
of 2 or 3am or not get any sleep at all
during very busy periods, like fashion
weeks. But I was very lucky in how
my business took off and one of the
“Although I have won several awards,
and I appreciate the awards, I have yet to
feel ‘very’ proud of myself. I always want
to work hard and keep learning. I want to
learn to be better every day and I don’t
think I will ever retire.”
Not one to sit on her laurels, Looi
has ventured out of clothing and into
eyewear carrying fashionable spectacle
frames and sunglasses under the Mell
brand. Besides that, Looi is applying her
designing expertise in various fields that
range from designing corporate apparels,
to luxurious corporate gifts and even to
designing kitchens.
my company is 100 per cent self-supported and financed with no loans. I
have learned my business skills by being in the industry and of course also
from making many mistakes.
Melinda Looi
things that kept me
going was all the support I got from my
customers, the media, friends as well as
my staff.”
At one time we had a franchised outlet in Kuwait, which was running very
well. But then the Kuwaiti counterpart
cheated us so we lost a lot of money
in this venture and this affected the
whole company to the extent that we
almost had to go bankrupt. I have always considered myself more of a
designer than a business person but I
learned to be very careful with money
matters ever since and luckily I have
some people in my company who are
experts in this field now.
Today, Looi’s main
showroom is in
Bangsar where she
creates and showcases her “Melinda Looi
Couture” collection
(made-to-measure
exclusive clothes).
Looi also has a Melinda Looi Prêt-aPorter collection carMelinda Looi’s showroom
rying ready-to-wear
evening dresses that
have garnered wide popularity among Taiwan and Australia.
socialites, office ladies, modern homemakers and those seeking for young, Supporting her own dreams
trendy and stylish apparels. In 2003, Although almost every fashion lover
Looi launched her casual line simply
today has heard of the name “Melinda
called Mell.
Looi,” the spirited and bold designer
The collection of this fashion design- is the first to admit that she has made
er today spans across the globe with many a mistake along the way.
clients from the United States, to Africa, Kuwait, Riyadh, Dubai, Bahrain,
Saudi Arabia, Hong Kong, Singapore,
“Fashion is a very expensive business, so money is always an issue as
No matter what obstacles had come
her way though, Looi never gave
up on her business. She firmly says:
“I continued to work no matter how
tough or hopeless a situation seemed.
“It motivated me to work harder and
harder and I believe it is very important for an entrepreneur to not shy
back from obstacles but to face them
head-on.”
At the end of the day, this mum of two
young children admits it is her passion that spurs her on. “I love and live
fashion and things related to it like
design and art. Putting all my energy
into things I love gives me the energy
I need to overcome obstacles.”