L aUnCH

Sitting in Ca SS andra M ac Gre G or’s studio, with sunlight pouring through the window and r aphael Saadiq playing on the stereo, the vibe is more a lice than Mad Hatter. MacGregor moved her millinery company, the House of MacGregor, to o ak Cliff a little more than a year ago. The Plano High School graduate, originally from Massachusetts, lives and works in o ak Cliff, but she got her fashion training in n ew York. She worked for Lynne Mackey, who designs hats for Broadway productions, and she put some of her creative product on the heads of cast members from “The Color Purple” and “Wicked.” She also worked for a haute couture milliner and a custom-hat designer who does highend weddings and Kentucky d erby hats.

How did you get into hat making?

I was an art history and English major, and I was working for an auction house in New York City. I took some hat-making classes at F.I.T. for fun. And the class was filled with people who were trying to get out of their 9-5 office jobs. That was in 2002. I took four classes, and eventually I quit my day job and started my own hat line that I sold at a store, and then I worked for hat makers at the same time.