Entering the Harris Tweed Hebrides mill, at Shawbost on Lewis, is like walking
through Play School’s round window.
It is a factory on a scale you don’t see any more. Here are the quarter-ton
bales of raw wool waiting to be dyed. Beside them, murky vats of liquid
labelled “moss green” and “drab four”. Before spinning, several colours are
mixed together to give the finished yarn its subtle, heathery flecks.
The recipes for each colour are written out by hand and the blending is done
in a small room with the aid of an industrial-sized hairdryer. It’s hard to
believe that the resulting heap of multicoloured candy floss will, in 15
minutes, be yarn.
At the other end of the process, rolls of fabric are stamped with the famous
orb that guarantees they are genuine Harris Tweed. They are labelled,
wrapped in plastic and then dispatched to customers all over the world.
Addresses in Japan, Germany — the single biggest market for Harris Tweed —
and Italy are written on in marker pen. One roll, of brown herringbone, is
destined for the Polo Ralph Lauren factory.
You could never guess from this cheerful scene that the islands are gripped by
tweed wars.
Brian Haggas, a septuagenarian Yorkshire businessman and textile veteran,
bought the biggest player in the tweed industry, the KM Group, in 2006. His
intentions were clear from the start. His mill would produce only a limited
range of tweeds, all of which would be made into men’s jackets. There would
be no more checks, tartans, bright colours or interesting heathery mixes to
be made into women’s clothes, curtains or, heaven forfend, cushions and
teddy bears. He was a man with a vision and it was styled with stout leather
buttons and pockets with flaps.
At the time of the takeover, Haggas was presented as the saviour of the
industry, which had been in decline since the 1980s. No longer. He has cut
the number of tweeds in production to just four. The finished cloth is
shipped to China, where it is made into the kind of jacket Boris Johnson’s
dad might reject as too old-fashioned. About 70,000 of these are currently
waiting to find a buyer.
With this huge stockpile in place, Haggas has laid off 36 of the Stornoway
mill’s 78 staff. The self-employed weavers who rely on the mill to provide
them with work are now getting what Haggas has described as “a trickle” of
lighter-weight tweeds to keep them going.
There have been some alarming headlines — “Government urged to step in as
tweed weavers face long lay-off”; “Threat to the very fabric of an island
culture” — as well as general misery, uncertainty and worry about the
future.
So islanders were surprised this month when a film unit descended from London
to make a movie about tweed, all funded by Haggas. Surprise turned to anger,
though, when it transpired that weavers were duped into appearing.
The Harris Tweed Story, a 30-minute film, tells the story of the history of
Harris tweed from the mid-19th century to the present day through the eyes
of a fictional island family. Some of the filming took place at a rival mill
because it had a more traditional look than Haggas’s own mill, and Harris
tweed cloth for the production was made by Donald John Mackay of the
independent Luskentyre Harris Tweed company.
The film is being directed by Peter Richardson, who made The Comic Strip
Presents comedy series, and the period costume designer is Jenny Beavan, who
has been nominated for eight Oscars and won for her work on A Room with a
View.
Mackay, a weaver on Harris who came to worldwide attention when his company
struck a deal with the sportswear giant Nike, says he was assured by the
production company that Haggas was not behind the film when he agreed to
make two pieces for it.
“Mr Haggas is reducing the industry,” said Mackay. “Why is he spending money
on a film when he has mothballed his mill and so many people depend on it
for their living?
“I did ask on two separate occasions was Mr Haggas involved, and I was
categorically told no.
“I wouldn’t do anything for him, he doesn’t deserve it. He doesn’t give a damn
for our product or our way of life. It’s him that’s number one, he’s not
doing it for us, he’s doing it for himself.”
Yet the Shawbost mill — the rival to Haggas — has shipped its first order to
Russia, is taking on new staff and is gearing up for Premiere Vision, the
world’s biggest textile trade fair, in Paris this September. A third,
smaller mill, Harris Tweed Textiles at Carloway, is also expanding. The
Harris Tweed Authority has a new chief executive, Lorna Macaulay, who is
young, local and fashion-literate.
Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, the Outer Hebrides council, has just started up a
Harris Tweed producers’ forum, compiled a database of the 30-odd craft
workers producing tweed items on the island, and has revived plans to open a
tweed visitor centre beside the ferry terminal in Harris.
Mackay’s firm, Luskentyre Harris Tweed, has diversified into supplying an
American backpack firm. Macaulay popped in recently and was amazed at how
busy he was. “His phone,” she says, “was hot.”
Mackay now sends his tweeds to be washed and finished at the Shawbost mill.
Previously part of the KM Group, it was not part of the Haggas deal and was
mothballed in summer 2006. The former trade minister Brian Wilson and the
oil millionaire Iain Taylor put up £800,000, and Ian Angus MacKenzie, the
former chief executive of the Harris Tweed Authority, moved in last winter.
There are now 29 people working there.
MacKenzie and one of the spinners were the first to arrive. They unlocked the
deserted mill in the depths of a Lewis winter, with horizontal rain and wild
gales.
“It was full of old machines. Water was running down the walls. It was like
the Black Hole of Calcutta,” recalls Mackenzie.
There is not much MacKenzie and the sales director, Rae Mackenzie (no
relation), who spent 40 years at the KM group, do not know about the
industry. They saw that Haggas’s four-pattern, jackets-only policy left a
huge gap in the market.
“Customers for the 2007/8 season were faced with having no Harris tweed. We
got in just in time to stop the main customers going elsewhere. There were
no big defections. Everyone has been very supportive. Some have bought just
to keep Harris tweed in their range, and to support us too.”
The mill is now working on orders from Japan, Italy, France, the US and
Germany. When Haggas turned his back on a £1m order from the German garment
manufacturer Bawi, the Carloway mill persuaded them to switch over to them.
Overseeing the whole industry from her Stornoway office, Lorna Macaulay shares
MacKenzie’s desire to move on without losing touch with the past. “We need
to ground Harris tweed in the fashion industry again. My job is to schmooze
and win back existing customers and to move into new and lucrative markets
such as China, India, Russia — any country where young professionals are
seeking western-style status.”
As long as Brian Haggas has 70,000 unsold jackets, though, Harris tweed’s
short-term future is going to feel shaky. Weavers, normally at their busiest
in summer, are nervous. But there is another way of looking at it: those
70,000 jackets represent new business.
Between them, the Carloway and Shawbost mills have picked up all Harris
tweed’s existing customers, and are out there looking for more.
“We need to be in touch with what the end customer is doing,” Macaulay says,
adding, “I need to work out how to get Harris tweed on David and Victoria
Beckham’s backs.”
