Our Story

Sarah Lorraine began long before Sarah was born, with her great-grandmother, Annie Bonner.

Annie was a dressmaker. As a young woman she moved from Bunbeg to Glasgow, where she opened a dress shop and made a life with her husband, who worked on the railways. When she was expecting their first and only child, her husband died.

When her son Matt was two, Annie came home to Bunbeg. She found a small byre, an old stone shed, and built a shop out of it with her own hands. There she tailored and made clothes for the people of Gaoth Dobhair, and that is how she made her living and raised her son.

The shop became Siopa Matt Bonner, and for almost a hundred years it served the community, open 364 days a year, through three generations of the Bonner family. When it closed its doors in 2022, it felt like the end of an era.

It wasn't. Sarah grew up hearing about the woman who kept going when life gave her every reason to stop, and that strength became her inspiration. She reopened her great-grandmother's shop in the very same place, and Annie's craft lives on in every Sarah Lorraine piece: timeless tailoring, Donegal tweed and Aran knitwear, made with the same care Annie put into every stitch.

"I absolutely love that I'm working in the same place Annie did. She was a legend in my family and in this area, and I know she would be proud."

Today Sarah Lorraine has boutiques in Bunbeg and Dungloe and sends Irish-made pieces all over the world. Every piece carries a little of Annie with it.