It requires a fair measure of careful contemplation to determine which of Carol Fraser’s many talents is her main line of business. She is the Chief Executive Officer of Miracle Hands Designs, an enterprise that operates from Non Pareil, East Coast Demerara. But in the 28 years that she has been in business, Fraser has turned her hands to numerous things.
Fraser is, among other things, a fashion designer, and, she says, a successful one. So successful that she has had to secure the services of a business consultant to support her in the marketing of her clothing.
That apart, Fraser’s skills with her hands embrace a range of other disciplines including interior decorating, costume designing, hairdressing, painting, sculpting and craft creation. There’s more. During the Christmas season, Fraser operates a cleaning company under the name ‘Rent A Wife’.
She is modest about her accomplishments. “Anything that I can put my hands on and make a difference, I try,” the assertive entrepreneur told Stabroek Business.
It was her ability to turn her hands to anything that led to the name Miracle Hands. Fraser believes that she inherited the facility with her hands from her mother. It was from her mother that she received her first sewing lessons. In the intervening years, she has sharpened her skills considerably. Her successful appearance at this year’s Caribbean Fashion and Trade Expo attested to the strides she has made in the intervening period.
Even now, Fraser says, she is still thrilled by the response of the visitors to the Trade Expo to her line of clothing and accessories and hats.
Her satisfaction with the outcome of that particular venture attests to the manifestation of a long-held ambition to succeed at that level.
Fresh from the success of the New York Trade Expo, Fraser is preparing to leave the country for Barbados to launch Foundation 100 and Organic Organism, genres of fashion that embrace natural fibres and leather. She is also mulling invitations from Trinidad and Tobago and the Bahamas to showcase her work in those Caricom countries. Some of the themes for her designs include “Organic Movement”, “Go Green and Grow” and “Eco Fantasy”.
For all her varied talents, Fraser says she always wanted to be a fashion designer which is why, even as a child, she played an active part in fashion shows at school. Immediately after leaving Berbice Educational Institute, she worked in the hairdressing, tailoring and teen fashion industries in Berbice. Additionally, she worked for Courts as an Interior Decorator, which allowed her to sustain her creative interests and eventually to further her studies in Leather Craft and Textiles at the Burrowes School of Art. It was at Burrowes that she was introduced to costume designing.
Fraser has been active in the costume design arena for the annual Mashramani celebrations and she disclosed that she has already offers to undertake costume design for the 2013 event.
Fraser said she loves changing things up and playing around with different looks. When the lives of shoes and bags are over, she adds more. Using fabric, she changes the look of the bag and/or shoe and, surprisingly, gets another two or three more years out of the bags and shoes.
