Serious Clothes

Tailoring, Power Dressing

A friend of mine who is also a client was lamenting to me recently about the lack of clothing she can wear when she is in court testifying as an expert on a big trial. Let’s start by saying, I am amazed and very entertained that I get to hear all these stories as a mere clothing designer about all the serious jobs my clients are doing while wearing my clothing. Over the years I have heard quite a lot of stories from women at the top of their professions and I am always struck by how clothing seems to play a big part in it. Now, my friend was insistent that she must look serious and corporate attire appropriate, but also stylish and perhaps just a hint of hot! ( which I loved and found endearing. ) We were discussing longer pencil skirts, my A-line Bell Skirts and Oona/ Pia blouses that frequent her looks, and how to adapt more pieces that could work in this world.

I have had a good amount of clients this year talking about the dearth of corporate wear or lack of sophistication in it: how terrible the fits are, the lack of higher quality brands doing anything for this part of the work sector. I think it comes down to tailoring personally, something that I focused on so much early on in my work and seems to be coming back into it more and more each year. I find myself making tailored custom pieces for serious women who know and appreciate the difference in grades of fabric and a perfect cut. These are women I enjoy chatting to about fashion and expression. Often they’re so opinionated and knowledgable about fashion sometimes even more so than my strictly fashion friends. I find that really interesting actually, I account that to their high intellect and attention to detail!

Something I gather from our conversations is that clothing really can help to project confidence or power, and I love to hear these women talking about how getting dressed for these quite stressful or intimidating situations that are so integral to their jobs sometimes is made a bit easier by clothing choices. As a sidenote it’s not just women: I watch my husband getting ready to perform in his shows as he sifts through a maze of beautifully tailored blazers and shirts. He often finds things for the stage way in advance. He really enjoys clothing much like these clients I am referencing. Since getting dressed is part of his job, it becomes perhaps a fun part of to alleviate a bit of the stress.

I often hear that Céline by Phoebe Philo was the last designer for women that truly created clothing for this niche very successfully. To be fair, of course this was for a high end designer client ready to invest in serious pieces and aspirational for most. I starting pouring through some of her older collections to the see the tie that binds them together. Her pants really stand out to me and the tailored skirts and even shirt or sweater proportions they had a blend of power, subversive conservatism, and also a sexiness to the cut that was subtle. I think that’s why women felt these clothes were designed for them to choose to wear. There would often be details hidden from the front, or tiny panels of color, details really more for the wearer. I really relate this this concept in designing and have always tried to accomplish this also. How can you make clothes that are interesting but enhancing so that they don’t shout just murmur.

It made me wonder why more designers don’t seem to be getting this right. Some times I think it’s the balance of fit and also the right fabric. Usually there is some compromise between the two. Of course there are a lot of high end designers doing quiet luxury pieces well, at the designer level: The Row, Gabriela Hearst, Brunello Cucinelli, Lora Piana, Khaite etc.. There are so many middle range pricepoint designers that do all of this too, but I can’t think of one that stands out to me. This could be also due to the fact that I mostly make my own clothing and I don’t have to dress for situations like this. Sometimes in recent years the fit is so oversized for brands and not in the Philo era Céline way where it was quite calulated. It was oversized here but cinched there just elegantly finding a balance. I think that intellectualism is what people are missing perhaps. ( Admittedly, The Row does this very well of course, but it’s just sadly not accessible to most.)

Not one to shy away from a challenge, I am trying to work on some interesting designs that can work in these worlds for my clients, perhaps a pencil skirt here a tailored blazer there. I do love to make a women feel strong and beautiful!

My one year anniversary of writing on substack is coming up this weekend, and I just wanted to say thank you for reading my posts. This has been so enjoyable to get back to some writing. I am learning a lot about my work and myself writing these posts, and it has been nice to chat with many of you. I will be sending something out this weekend to paid subscribers. Thanks for being here! If you liked this post and don’t mind to press the heart button below to like it, it just helps more people see it. Have a lovely week!