Theresa Parker

Research Student

Theresa Parker is affiliated with The Open University's Department of People and Organisations.

You can email Theresa Parker directly but for media enquiries, please contact a member of The Open University's Media Relations Team.

Biography

Theresa has been awarded a fully funded studentship. Her research focuses on the lived experience of menopause for UK fashion workers in fashion workplaces. She is supervised by Professor Joanna Brewis and Dr Saoirse O’Shea.

Theresa has a BA (Hons) in Fashion Design from Ravensbourne University, London, an MA (RCA)in Fashion Design from the Royal College of Art and a PGCE from University of Brighton.

Prior to pursuing a full time PHD program, Theresa worked in the fashion industry as a women’s wear designer and product developer, and as a senior tutor and department head in a number of fashion schools. When she can, she still works in industry as a freelance creative pattern cutter specialising in a draping technique called moulage, and in education on MA Womenswear Fashion Innovation courses.

As a menopausal fashion worker, Theresa identifies strongly with the subject and subjects of her research and sees her PHD as an opportunity to contribute to what is known on a topic that is still largely taboo in society and especially in the youth obsessed fashion industry. She is interested in the challenges faced both by cis and TGNC fashion practitioners as they age and hopes her qualitative research will help in acknowledging the diversity of ways in which menopause is experienced and affects working lives. Everyone’s experiences are equally important to the study so opening the menopause discourse up to include everyone in it that needs to be could enable a better understanding of the real issues that face ageing UK fashion workers and contribute to the development of more effective solutions to improve working life for everyone.

Theresa recently presented on the intersection of ageism and fashion at The Future of International Fashion Design Education symposium hosted by Istituto Marangoni London. She is also a member of the Gendered Organisational Practice (GOP) Research Cluster group at the OU.