Diana wedding dress designer Elizabeth Emanuel seeks £1.5m funding Emanuel has hired Beer & Partners to help raise the money, capitalising in part on renewed interest in her designs following last year's wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. The funds will help her new firm, Art of Being, to launch and to recruit a chief executive to run the business. She hopes to focus on traditional couture as well as creating a ready-to-wear range. The fashion designer has spent much of the past week pitching to angel investors introduced to her by Beer & Partners, which specialises in raising money for small and medium-sized companies. The funds will be raised in three parts, with an initial £150,000 expected to be raised by the end of this week, followed by £400,000 in September and the rest at some point next year. Emanuel, who will be creative director, said: "The missing link at the moment is a chief executive who will have the most important input, besides me."