Born into a Franco-Manitoban M\u00e9tis family, Andr\u00e9anne Dandeneau has turned her passion for fashion into a career. In 2005, she launched her\u00a0VOIL\u00c0 par Andr\u00e9anne\u00a0<\/em>designer label after completing CDEM\u2019s\u00a0\u00c9t\u00e9 en affaires<\/em>\u00a0business start-up program. Says Dandeneau: \u201cMy business started out in my parents\u2019 basement, in the family home.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n While the young entrepreneur now owns her own stand-alone shop, her family is still very involved. \u201cMy company is a family business in the true sense of the word. It\u2019s a group effort.\u00a0My family has always been a great source of inspiration for me.\u201d<\/p>\n Andr\u00e9anne Dandeneau says she owes her family a great deal. \u201cWithout my family, especially my parents, I wouldn\u2019t be where I am today. The experience would have been much more difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n Her mother, Huguette, taught her to be proud of her M\u00e9tis heritage and to care deeply about the environment. Her father, David, influenced Andr\u00e9anne through his art. Today, he creates M\u00e9tis prints for his daughter\u2019s collection.<\/p>\n Andr\u00e9anne Dandeneau decided to change the name of her business to honour her French\/M\u00e9tis heritage. Her designer creations are now marketed under the\u00a0Anne Mulaire<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0brand.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cVOIL\u00c0<\/em>\u00a0didn\u2019t represent me,\u201d says the designer. \u201cWith\u00a0Anne Mulaire<\/em>, I\u2019m simply going back to my name, which was really important to me. It represents me and where I come from. My friends and family call me Anne, and Mulaire is a connection to my M\u00e9tis side.\u201d<\/p>\n Andr\u00e9anne Dandeneau is, in fact, the great-great-great-granddaughter of Catherine Mulaire, who was born in 1843. The daughter of a Voyageur and the first rural M\u00e9tis teacher in the Red River Settlement, Catherine was also an accomplished seamstress whose embroidery continues to inspire Andr\u00e9anne\u2019s designs. It therefore made complete sense for the young designer to take her ancestor’s name.<\/p>\n While her M\u00e9tis heritage is important to Andr\u00e9anne Dandeneau and is reflected in her clothing line, she is also committed to the environment. \u201cI\u2019ve always been environmentally conscious. There was no way I was going to create a business that didn\u2019t respect the environment. The clothes I create are as eco-friendly as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cPeople are welcome to come and handle the clothes and try them on at one of our cross-Canada shows to see for themselves. It\u2019s a lot more concrete than on our website at\u00a0annemulaire.ca.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Andr\u00e9anne\u2019s designs have travelled kilometres, from show to show but also via the website: \u201cWe are now selling clothes online across Canada and in the US, Australia, Germany, Italy and the UK.\u201d<\/p>\n The designer recently received a $100,000 grant from Western Economic Diversification (WD) Canada. \u201cWe can use this money to further market the company. I\u2019ve been in business for 15 years and some people still haven\u2019t heard of us! We also want to make our website fully bilingual.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cLastly, the money will allow us to work with the World Trade Centre Winnipeg. We\u2019re currently preparing an export plan for sales in the US.\u00a0That all costs money, so the grant will really help us.\u201d<\/p>\n But Andr\u00e9anne\u2019s big dream is to go to Europe. \u201cI\u2019d love to take part in European fashion shows. I hope to get there one day. But for now, I\u2019m focusing on Canada and the United States.\u201d<\/p>\nSee her new collection on September 28th and 29th<\/h3>\n
Anne Mulaire\u00a0 – 421 Mulvey Avenue<\/h3>\n
Shop online:\u00a0annemulaire.ca<\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":4210,"template":"","type-de-publication":[69,68],"class_list":["post-4211","publications","type-publications","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","type-de-publication-business-services","type-de-publication-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cdem.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/publications\/4211","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cdem.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/publications"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cdem.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/publications"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cdem.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cdem.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4211"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"type-de-publication","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cdem.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/type-de-publication?post=4211"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}