Officers

Elizabeth Fox is a Bristolian by birth, but left the West Country to read law at the University of Leeds and then moved to London where she was called to the Bar. An unexpected job offer then took her to France, followed by a spell in Brussels.

On returning to the UK, Liz became Assistant Director of the British Clothing Industry Association (BCIA), responsible for trade policy, travelling regularly to meetings of the European Clothing Industry Association in Brussels, where all meetings were then held in French. The Multi Fibre Arrangement (MFA) with its system of quotas on low cost clothing and textile imports governed much of world trade at the time.  

Liz has been the Chairman of the BSI Committee on clothing (both woven and knitted) and interior textiles for some thirty years and has represented BSI on various European (CEN) Committees. Latterly, she has done a lot of work on childrenswear, including on cords and drawstrings and mechanical safety.

Liz was awarded the Companionship of the Textile Institute in 2019.

The formation of the Textile Livery Group is something that Liz has much welcomed, not least because it has reconnected some Livery Companies with the industry sectors from which they were formed many centuries ago and allows all Livery Companies with a textile interest to get involved in areas of concern to the whole industry, as well as demonstrating to industry that the Livery movement still has relevance today.

Liz’s consort for the year is her nephew, Michael Skeates. In her “spare time”, of which there is not much as she is also an elder in the Church of Scotland, Liz admits that a day spent at Lords would probably be top of her list, not least because she played cricket at school and university, and watching Bristol City play at Ashton Gate would probably be her second.