Paula Lishman Named Canadian Fur Personality of the Year, Receives Maurice Memorial Award

FUR COUNCIL OF CANADA PRESS RELEASE, JUNE 28, 2000

Paula Lishman Named Canadian Fur Personality of the Year, Receives Maurice Memorial Award

Paula Lishman Photo: Fur Council of Canada

Paula is a pioneer of knitted wool, in this case beaver exhibited at theNorth American Fur & Fashion Exposition 2000. Photo: T. Platt, FCUSA.

Montreal: For the year 2000, the Fur Council of Canada presented the Maurice Memorial Award to Paula Lishman. The award, which was first presented in 1957, recognizes outstanding contributions to the betterment of the Canadian fur trade. Lishman is the first woman to receive the award. It was presented by Tom Nacos, Chairman of the Fur Council of Canada, during the Montreal NAFFEM 2000 Gala Evening.

Born in Montreal and raised in Labrador, Paula Lishman likes to tell the story of how she couldn’t find any clothes that fit her tall stature when she was a teenager, and so she started designing her own. She didn’t know it then, but this was the beginning of one of the most remarkable careers as a fur creator and design pioneer.

Her company, Paula Lishman International, is now based in the rural community of Blackstock, Ontario, and employs as many as 100 local women in production. Her husband, Bill Lishman is considered a hero in the environmental movement for his work with migrating birds, as shown in feature films like “Fly Away Home”. “I guess we’re Father Goose and Mother Beaver”, chuckles Ms. Lishman.

Recognized for her notable work in creating unique fur garments, Lishman once felt like the black sheep of her industry, “Furriers thought I was crazy to be ripping up perfectly good fur into strips for my knitting”. Today, twenty years later, Paula Lishman exports to markets around the world; a standing ovation from the crowd at the Montreal NAFFEM Gala showed how far she has come since those first days in the fur business.

Lishman, who is also First Vice-President of the FCC board, is a strong advocate of the environmental virtues of the fur trade which she speaks out about articulately with consumers and media in her many travels around the globe. She is best known for having created and popularized the knitted fur technique, which is now widely applied by many fur manufacturing companies everywhere. “Paula Lishman has added many new dimensions to fur designing and manufacturing, she is a true ambassador of the fur trade”, says Alan Herscovici, Executive Vice-President of the FCC.

For more information contact: Teresa Éloy, Communications Director, Fur Council of Canada, 1435 St. Alexandre, Suite 1270, Montreal, Quebec H3A 2G4; 1-800-376-9996 or (514) 844-1945; (514) 844-8593/fax; canfur@generation.net