Clothing with a Conscience: Revisiting Gwen Cunningham's Tales of Sustainability and Style
Desert Island DressShow Notes
In this follow-up episode of Desert Island Dress, Dee and Katriona sit down to unpack last week’s conversation with sustainability advocate Gwen Cunningham. They delve into the intriguing stories Gwen shared, including the myth of the selkie, which opened up a rich discussion on women’s identity, freedom, and societal expectations.
Drawing from Gwen’s four selected items, Dee and Katriona explore the surprising ways in which clothing holds memories, connects us to our roots, and can even challenge us to think differently about our environmental impact.
As they discuss Gwen’s treasured items, from a well-worn Superman T-shirt to a childhood cloak tied to Irish folklore, Dee and Katriona also reflect on their own memories and the items that shaped them as children. The conversation explores the notion of "emotionally durable design" and considers how our emotional connections to clothing might influence a more mindful approach to fashion.
In this Episode, We Reflect On:
The selkie myth and its metaphorical link to women’s identity and autonomy
How memories of childhood items shape our sense of self
Gwen’s perspective on communal wardrobes and the value of shared garments
The concept of emotionally durable design and its potential to make fashion more sustainable
The interplay between tradition, mythology, and personal identity in the clothes we wear
Continue the Conversation: What items of clothing from your past hold special meaning for you? We’d love to hear your stories! Share with us on Instagram @desert_island_dress.
Listen & Subscribe: Don’t miss our future reflections and guest episodes! Subscribe to Desert Island Dress on your preferred podcast platform to stay up-to-date with new episodes.
More from Desert Island Dress
Welcome back to our post-analysis episode of Desert Island Dress. Every other week, we take a moment to reflect on the stories and choices shared in the main conversation and pull on one of the threads that caught our attention. ✨ Stay connected with Desert Island Dress: 📸 Instagram: @desert_island_dress 🌐 Website: www.desert-island-dress.com 💌 Share your favourite episode of Desert Island Dress with a friend For more stories, news and updates — including our first live show in Copenhagen with the Embassy of Ireland and recently published articles in RTÉ Brainstorm, visit: www.desert-island-dress.com
This week’s guest is painter Carl Hickey. If you are not familiar, Carl’s work is celebrated for capturing those everyday, instantly recognisable moments in life. Recent paintings have depicted two guys sporting their much-coveted 3D glasses, waiting for the solar eclipse back in August; or two lads e-scooting through Dublin city; or his mam getting her nails painted by her next-door neighbour outside her home in Clondalkin during the summer heatwave. Speaking of heat, we recorded this chat back in the summer. The studio was sweltering, so fair play to Carl for getting through the full hour in the extra-hot seat, with not a window to open! Through his four items - which he had understood needed to be something old, something new and something borrowed, but the choices worked anyway - we get a great sense of Carl and his easy-going nature. We hear how he almost didn’t bother applying for college, before going on to apply himself to such an extent that he graduated with a first-class honours degree from the National College of Art and Design (NCAD) here in Dublin. There’s a lovely theme running through the conversation about the significance of ‘the suit’ in a young man’s life, and, in a way, how men gradually grow into it. At first, it’s something to almost play around with, dressing up, experimenting with the clothes, until one day he will find himself wearing a full suit, and it will be of no particular significance at all. He will have simply grown into it. Elsewhere, our conversation takes us from Guineys, a longstanding Dublin retail institution on Talbot Street, to gangster grandads in trench coats, to the remoteness of Ballinskelligs, where Carl seems more fazed by the challenge of keeping a fire lit in his country lodgings than by anything Dublin's busy streets can throw at him. Carl was heading out to meet friends straight after chatting with us, and he strikes us as exactly the kind of person you’d love to have at your table on a night out. Our thanks to Carl for keeping Desert Island Dress on his podcast list for 2026! _____________________________________________ ✨ Stay connected with Desert Island Dress: 📸 Instagram: @desert_island_dress 🌐 Website: www.desert-island-dress.com 💌 Share your favourite episode of Desert Island Dress with a friend For more stories, news and updates — including our first live show in Copenhagen with the Embassy of Ireland and recently published articles in RTÉ Brainstorm, visit: www.desert-island-dress.com
Welcome back to our post-analysis episode of Desert Island Dress. Every other week, we take a moment to reflect on the stories and choices shared in the main conversation and pull on one of the threads that caught our attention. ✨ Stay connected with Desert Island Dress: 📸 Instagram: @desert_island_dress 🌐 Website: www.desert-island-dress.com 💌 : Share your favourite episode of Desert Island Dress with a friend For more stories, news and updates — including our first live show in Copenhagen with the Embassy of Ireland and recently published articles in RTÉ Brainstorm, visit: www.desert-island-dress.com
Today, we are honoured to welcome Caoilfhionn Gallagher to Desert Island Dress. Caoilfhionn is a barrister and has worked in London at the renowned Doughty Street Chambers for over 20 years, alongside similarly excellent human rights barristers such as Amal Clooney, fighting for justice — particularly for those who do not have the voice or reach to advocate for themselves. Her next steps include founding an independent organisation to continue this important work. Even after talking with Caoilfhionn for just an hour, we came away humbled by what was on our own plates, as she casually shared just some of the items on her calendar for that week alone! She is a force of nature: so articulate, insightful and hugely knowledgeable, while also being incredibly self-aware and introspective. As Katriona rightly points out, to hear ‘Imposter Syndrome’ come up is not where you’d expect this conversation to go. Yet Caoilfhionn brilliantly illustrates how legacy systems and organisations can create worlds that signal to you that you do not belong. She describes an encounter at a stuffy legal outfitter while hiring the ceremonial attire she needed to become a senior barrister — a highly prestigious appointment. When she asked for the prescribed patent-buckled shoes in her petite shoe size, the outfitter sniffed that they only stocked them from size 6 upwards. I thought this was a simple yet highly illustrative example of the social cues we might interpret as telling us that we don’t belong in certain spaces. We literally don’t fit in their shoes. Each of Caoilfhionn’s four items leads to beautiful conversations that stretch from the personal — including teenage memories, family love and loss — through to accents and the Irish and British social class systems, and the power of a T-shirt to advocate for human rights. It’s all here, told through the wonderfully worded stories of our second guest of the series, Caoilfhionn Gallagher.
Welcome back to our post-analysis episode of Desert Island Dress. Every other week, we take a moment to reflect on the stories and choices shared in the main conversation and pull on one of the threads that caught our attention. ✨ Stay connected with Desert Island Dress: 📸 Instagram: @desert_island_dress 🌐 Website: www.desert-island-dress.com 💌 Share your favourite episode of Desert Island Dress with a friend For more stories, news and updates — including our first live show in Copenhagen with the Embassy of Ireland and recently published articles in RTÉ Brainstorm, visit: www.desert-island-dress.com