Several months ago, in the coldest of Chicago winters I set about to design a line of garments that I both believed in and felt excited to create and wear, focusing on sustainability and material, technique and tradition. Dedicating myself to these concepts allowed me to release myself from the yoke of conventional design models, and allowed me to embrace a singular idea: style.
Style in relation to dress is as ubiquitous a term as diet, which can relate to anything you put in your mouth. Style, in all of its vague definitions can be used to describe the way we choose to dress ourselves, with careful consideration or apathetic abandon. The word has edged its way into my periphery in the daily ritual of dressing myself: vacantly gazing into the depths of my closet, touching its contents, and feeling the general dissatisfaction that comes with selecting an outfit configured by another hand. As a maker, especially one of clothing, it can feel incredibly reductive to dress in a mass manufacturer’s idea of clothing. I have felt alternately frustrated and bored, as my identity as an individual is at odds with adorning myself in limitless copies of thoughtless garments. The feeling of frustration from the act of dressing - a process that should be joyful, curious, exploratory and thoughtful - has not been for nothing. An introspective look at myself, what I enjoy making, the shape of my body, and how I want to present for the world resulted from the general malaise of dressing in clothes I didn’t believe in. And this catalytic thought process forced more consideration upon myself: with all the skills to create, why am I not making my own clothes?
The jackets I have been creating using Levi’s denim and responsibly sourced fur have been both unexpectedly rewarding as well as challenging. Deconstructing and developing patterns, stretching and stitching furs has been an incredibly time consuming process that has created an intimacy between myself and each piece. Slow fashion exists in this realm, where time is marked not by hours, but by progress, trials, setbacks, successes. The longer a garment takes from conception to creation, the more excited I am to bring it into the public sphere, and share the body of work I have been laboring over. This new relationship with cloth, forged by slow processes and the endurance of making has created an invaluable bond with each piece as it comes together stitch by stitch. As its maker, I am well aware of its history - the patterning and critical eye that discerns an original prototype to final sample, the all consuming days of meticulous hand stitching, and the process of working with sustainable materials while creating something innovative, and cohesive as a collection. This foray into slow fashion, made by hand, one of one garment making has readjusted my own perception of time, but also quality and most of all, style. I thrills me to continue crafting each jacket and spending time with each garment independently. I am excited for the day when the entire collection will be complete, and I will be able to share this endeavor in the public sphere. In the meantime, it is my own personal joy to create something beautiful, handmade, and full of it;s own latent identity and history, something so needed today in fashion.