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Overview
This is one of many sewing patterns Lya Riley (nee Kleinmann) used to make clothes for her children in the 1950s. Lya’s daughter Lysette selected it for the collection, as it was one of the patterns Lya used often.
Lya Kleinmann was born in Vienna on 27 March 1921, the only child of Emil Kleinmann and Eugenie Rosenberg. Emil was a director at Anker Insurance, and the family enjoyed a comfortable middle-class lifestyle. They had a cook and a maid, and all of Lya’s clothes were made by a dressmaker.
Lya and her mother Eugenie fled Austria in 1939 and lived in London throughout the Second World War (1939-1945). After the war Lya met a Londoner named William (Bill) George Alexander Riley, and she followed him to New Zealand in 1948. They were married in Dunedin in October that year, and quickly purchased an old Victorian cottage at 247 North Road. Their first child Lysette was born in January 1950, and Peter followed in December 1951.
Bill worked as a cook and as a subeditor at the Otago Daily Times, while Lya taught herself to cook, draft patterns and sew clothing for her children. Sewing is a thread that runs through generations of the family, as Lya’s maternal grandmother Amalia was a talented needleworker and after moving to London in 1939 her mother Eugenie worked as a tailor.
References:
- Riley, Lysette and Helen Riley-Duddin, 2021. Conversations and emails with curators Katie Cooper and Stephanie Gibson.
- Riley, Lysette, 2021. Unpublished biography of Lya Kleinmann, born 27 March 1921 Vienna.