Historical information
About the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games donor Doug Pleasance wrote-
During the 1980's the Australian wool industry was at its most prosperous times with record numbers of sheep producing wool receiving ever increasing values due to the success of the Reserve Price Scheme, and the overall guidance of the Australian Wool Corporation (AWC).
As a humble technician, my role was a low profile newly created position of Controller, Technical Marketing where wool was to be marketed on its technical properties, as distinct from the Product Marketing Group which exploited the traditional high profile approach of marketing wool;s superior fashion attributes. The Woolmark was the tool central to this approach.
The 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games saw an evolutionary change in designer selection. A Declaration of Interest Form was communicated to over forty potential designers. The task and especially tight timelines that were involved deterred many aspirants, however, there remained eight designers with the potential we were seeking. These eight designers were paid $3,000 per submission and the winning designer, Wendy Powitt, was paid $15,000. For the first time the judging panel included two athletes, one male swimmer and one female basketballer, their influence was pivotal.
The ensemble consisted of three elements-
1. The Official Uniform which was used for travel and all official functions. This included: a tailored blazer and trouser/skirt (all water repellent) by Fletcher Jones, pure wool olive-green faille fabric by Foster Valley, cotton PE formal shirt by Pelaco, pure wool knitwear by Spangaro, printed wool tie by TD Noone, wool nylon socks by Holeproof and footwear by Hush Puppy.
2. Opening Ceremony Uniform a lightweight wool fabric printed with floral designs that had been inspired by the work of Australian artist Margaret Preston. This included: Lightweight W/PE shorts by Fletcher Jones in Foster Valley Fabric, socks by Holeproof and footwear by Hush Puppy.
3. Village Clothing was designed to be highly visible garments to make it easy to spot the Aussie and helped to contribute to good team spirit. This included: A pure wool shirt featuring blocks of contrasting colours, and a newly developed stretch 50:50 wool/cotton fabric by Bradmill was made into shorts and jeans by Fletcher Jones.
Physical description
8133.1 - The front of the short sleeved shirt has four colour blocks. The bottom two quadrants of the shirt are yellow and cream, the top two are red, above the cream, and green, above the yellow. The collar of the shirt is cream and the cuffs of the shirt are yellow. The back of the shirt is solid green. There are seven buttons with small amounts of colour on them to do up the shirt, and a motif of Australia made up of curving, crosshatching lines on the left of the shirt, sitting over the line between the red and cream colours.
8133.2 - The front of the short sleeved shirt has four colour blocks. The bottom two quadrants of the shirt are yellow and cream, the top two are red, above the cream, and green, above the yellow. The collar of the shirt is cream and the cuffs of the shirt are yellow. The back of the shirt is solid green. There are seven buttons with small amounts of colour on them to do up the shirt, and a motif of Australia made up of curving, crosshatching lines on the left of the shirt, sitting over the line between the red and cream colours. The bottom hem of the shirt is asymmetrical with the back of the shirt longer than the front.
8133.3 - Red fabric sample.
8133.4 - Red fabric sample.
8133.5 - White fabric sample with permanent marker writing "F22630." This sample also has the tag attached.
8133.6 - White fabric sample.
8133.7 - White fabric sample.
8133.8 - Green fabric sample.
Inscriptions & markings
8133.5 - On tag -
"Allan Robison Textiles
Design F22853 82m
30 Wangaratta St Richmond Victoria, 3121, Australia
Tel 429 - 9600 Fax 427 - 0594"
