Romola my mother gave birth to five children all born within the space of eight years. My place was in the middle, a brother and sister above, and a brother and sister below. As a child my mother taught me to draw, sew, cut patterns, cook, dig vegetables, screw in nails change light bulbs and prune roses, at the time we lived in a Yorkshire stone house called Rose Cottage the name inspired by a considerable number of roses. It was with the inspiration from my mother and the influence generally that surrounded me as I was growing up that I was encouraged to venture into the world of design.

My first choice was graphics as I elaborately decorated the weekly letter to my parents while at boarding school. Then it was soft sculpture, but the echo of my father telling me that it is difficult to make a living discouraged me. Finishing school I went to York college of art where I was introduced to textiles and I chose to specialize in print. For my degree I chose Brighton University. A course that combined print with fashion and business studies.

As part of the course at Brighton I did an internship in Lyon, France, the center of silk printing. First at the House of Bianchini Ferrier. There I was given the opportunity to study the archive collection that dated back to the 18th century. Including a collection of print designs by Raoul Dufy for Paul Poiret.  I then went to Brochier  a printing company established in 1922, and despite new technology the chosen technique of printing was the “planche”, block printing method and as many as twenty five colors  for a  design; that is to say a block for each color. I had the opportunity of choosing designs from the extensive archive and re-coloring them. During this period I was working amongst the most exclusive collections of printed fabric in the world. 

After my degree I had a brief period in a design studio on the edge of Hampstead Heath, and from there I went to a multi-international printing company on the Swiss / French border. Texunion SPA There as part of the design studio I witnessed mass production with world- wide distribution of printed fabric, it lasted only a year as I chose to leave for a warmer climate and so I arrived in Florence, Italy where I got swept up in the Italian life-style of easy fun loving people. Italy was in a period of growth. “Made in Italy” became the key word for quality and style. The buzzing town of Prato the center of the wool trade was my back ground. Frequently the roads were blocked with lorries piled high with rolls of fabric or wool as they journeyed from one factory to another. The predictions for the seasonal fabric colors could be witnessed in the river Bisenzio. and the aroma of damp wool hang like a cloud over the city. Prato then was a heaving center of commerce. Today the same city is a shadow of its former glory. Much of Italian businesses have been replaced by China offering the domestic and world market a more competitive price. Prato is now a myriad of Chinese calligraphy indicating numerous factories in the heart of the Italian textile center.

During the time that I was working as a designer, I witnessed an economic boom and the printing factory where I worked which had been established by Sarti Faliero ( www.falierosarti.com ) grew rapidly. Within a brief period we were delivering printed fabric to top brands throughout Europe. Paul Smith, Vivian Westwood, Versace, Calvin Klein, Guess, Diesel, are just a few of the many with whom we worked with at the time.

With Prato suffering a decline it became clear that to continue my work as a designer it was necessary to move to the industrial north and so we established ourselves among the shoe manufactures of the Riviera del Brenta. Famous also for its Palladian villas and the Burchiello, the boat that gently glides its way down the canal to Venice. 

Venice was the city where Mariano Fortuny had established himself in the late 1800's, his technique of gold printed velvet and his pleated silk gowns were my inspiration during my degree. 

In this visually rich environment I set-up a company with a print factory. We transformed imported gray fabric with innovative printing and dying techniques. Unfortunatly competition from abroard was high and companies in Europe were suffering with economical instability. The project failed. However I continued my work offering consultancy to factory's in Turkey. I was invited to Bursa the center of textiles. I remember that the journey was considerable, a flight to Rome or Vienna with a change for Istanbul where I would be met by a chauffeur. Two hours by car through the jam packed, streets of Istanbul to the port in order to cross the Bosfero to Asia. A domestic crossing full of families old and young drinking “chai”. And then four hours across the mountains to Bursa. The project was to pull together the numerous fabrics, designs and color pallets and give it some sense of direction by dividing the material into stories and creating predictions. So as to be able to present a true collection with a sense and purpose to be judged by the accepting panel of Premier Vision in Paris.

The company got accepted and I lost my job.

It was by this time that I was begining to think that I was best off on my own hence the birth of Teresa Bunting Scarves.

Thanks to advanced technology during my career as a print designer the technique of printing has under- gone considerable change. In the past the printing machine was 100 meters long two thirds of the machine was a closed environment used for fixing the color onto the fabric the result was not visible until the end of the machine. It was therefore essential a minimum order of 100 meters.  The cost of cutting the cylinders, a cylinder for each color made a substantial initial investment. But by the time I was ready to make it on my own the art of printing had been revolutionized. 

Today it is possible to transfer a photographic image onto the fabric via computer using an ink-jet technique. The result is immediate and there are no limits to quantity. This has enabled me to realize my designs in small exclusive runs. Using varying qualities and surfaces giving me the opportunity to create for fashion, accessories, interiors and furniture. 

Teresa Bunting Scarves is the result after working as a textile designer for some of the best companies and labels in the world, I wanted to find a new way to express my passion for design, color and fabric. The result is this collection and it represents my lifelong ideal to create beauty. Each design has emerged out of my years of studying and designing textiles, drawing inspiration from all over the world. Every piece is produced to the very highest quality, every detail individually handled with love. These are works of art and this is what I do.