General News
5 May, 2026
Hidden in the rainforest is a global designer
JUST like the tiny crystals she sews into a creation to add that subtle sparkle, designer and embroidery artist Leah Kelly is tucked away in the rainforest of Kuranda yet wowing the international EcoFashion world.
Ms Kelly is the creator of stunning gowns that feature splashes of her fine stitching, the addition of stones or anything else that captures her imagination, on fabric made from hemp, hemp silk, bamboo, banana, pineapple and wild nettle.
For almost 10 years, she has showcased her designs across the country and internationally through Eco Fashion Week Australia.
“I blew them away with banana and pineapple, they were like, ‘What?’,” she says with a grin.
“A lot of people were using recycled fabrics, which was cool, it is good to recycle, but no-one was sourcing what I was using, in the way I was using it.”
Over the past four years, Ms Kelly has been invited to show her designs in Paris (which switched to London because of political unrest), then Italy and next year, Vancouver. But she has yet to actually get to these global reveals.
Stuck at home because of COVID-19, she watched the London show from her garden at midnight with friends who set up a big screen and live feed.
Despite the distance, Ms Kelly felt every moment of the night’s magic. She had given more than her designs for this debut – she had given the “whole me”.
“I even composed the music for it, on the piano,” she says.
“One of my dear friends played the cello, and another dear friend played his didgeridoo, and I had recorded all these bird sounds, and the thunder from here, and I did the showcase as ‘Rainforest to Runway’.”
As she watched, she saw the audience, heads down, looking at their phones.
“All of a sudden, that sound of the didgeridoo and my piano just came in, and we saw them put their phones down, and they were like this,” she mimics their heads shooting up.
“And then my first piece came out, and I was done for,” she laughs. “I bawled my eyes out.”
View her designs at Didi La Baÿsse Art Studio & Gallery,20 Coondoo St, Kuranda.
