THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 21, 1995 TAG: 9505180363
SECTION: CAROLINA COAST PAGE: 24 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Mary Ellen Riddle
LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines
Sixteen years after Donna Haddon incorporated Donna Designs, she's starting over - in a sense.
As Haddon, 43, opens two new shops featuring her nature designs on T-shirts, clothing and canvas, she also enters the last stages of pregnancy. Baby Haddon is due June 15. But the show must go on.
Haddon's business is thriving, summer and crowds are beating at the door, and there's work to do.
Fortunately, another of Haddon's natural creations, her 24-year-old daughter Mayre Lifsey, will head up the new Donna Designs in Corolla. And Haddon's husband, Tom, will oversee the new Kitty Hawk store as well as two other shops in Duck and Nags Head.
The family has their hands full.
Right now, the Donna Designs warehouse is packed with ceiling-high boxes ready to be taken to the northernmost store. Several of Haddon's paintings are packaged and will be sent to the printer to create a limited edition of prints.
Deeper into the massive studio, carefully designed and built by Haddon's husband, a network of rooms are filled with activity. Standing out among crisp white T-shirts and rows of drying purple and turquoise baby booties is Lifsey's loom, waiting to be dressed.
A recent graduate of East Carolina University with a degree in textile design, Lifsey hopes to find time to create clothing and art on the loom while holding down the Corolla post.
But Lifsey's first work to christen the wooden structure will be a chenille baby blanket for her soon-to-arrive sibling.
Growing up with an artistic mom had its perks. Lifsey wore handmade clothing crocheted by her mother. During slumber parties, she and her friends would airbrush T-shirts.
``That's why people liked to spend the night with me,'' Lifsey said. ``I always had paint available. I would mix up her designs and play with them.''
Lifsey spent little time away from her mother. Before she was finished with her first decade of life, her mother was selling her work wholesale to shops around the world. Then Haddon went to solely retail.
From the initial hundred-dozen shirts she produced in the early retail days for the Nags Head store, she produces today an average of 1,200 dozen to 1,500 dozen T-shirts annually. And those numbers do not include the many other items Haddon designs.
So it was no big surprise that the child who grew up around art would pursue a creative career. But Haddon was surprised that Lifsey chose to weave.
``It doesn't suit her personality at all,'' Haddon said, describing her daughter as a child who was always ``bouncing off the walls.'' Weaving takes great patience.
``It's real relaxing,'' Lifsey said. ``You can put together color you wouldn't expect to put together.''
Haddon said her daughter's weaving is ``beautiful to watch.''
Mother and daughter learn from each other. Lifsey brought back new batik techniques to share with Haddon.
``She learned new methods at school and passed them back to me,'' Haddon said. To her daughter, she added, ``I tried to learn as much as I could while I was paying for you to go to school.''
But Lifsey has also been influenced by her mother. One of her tapestry designs incorporated a butterfly wing inspired by a series of paintings by Haddon. ILLUSTRATION: Photo by MARY ELLEN RIDDLE
Donna Haddon and her daughter, Mayre Lifsey, right, are preparing
for the opening of two stores and the arrival of a new family
member.
by CNB