Switching Gears

In my last post related to the development of my line, I had discussed selling my knits on consignment. Through the process, I came to a couple of conclusions:

1. Producing the knits in New York at relatively small quantities meant that I was making a very small margin -- I had to sell the pieces at a certain price to make back what I had spent, and it was hard to sell the pieces at too high a price since my label was unknown and there was nothing obviously special about the pieces. What I mean is that my design details were on the subtle side, whereas most people who buy something "designer" expect the garments to have something flashy or different about them.

2. The pieces that I was most excited about weren't always the ones that sold the best -- i.e. people reacted most to the more accessible items. I needed to think more about what my target customer wanted.

3. I wasn't that excited about designing these types of knits. If I was going to continue tees, they either had to be even more "high-end" with more intricate embellishments, or --

I decided to change directions with my line and go a little more dressy. I decided to do a small collection of silk dresses. At first, I was going to try to have it ready for Spring/Summer 2009, but I felt rushed. After meeting with my friend's cousin, Keryn Dizon, the designer of the line, Elijah, and asking her for advice, I decided to take my time in developing the next collection.

In the meantime, my friend Michelle introduced me to her friend, Noelle Stout and Emily Benson, who had started a production company on the side called House of Noem. Noelle worked in real estate advertising for TimeOut New York and Emily worked as a merchant for Henri Bendel. They wanted to help an emerging designer stage a fashion show so we met up in October 2008 to get the ball rolling.

We decided to do a presentation as opposed to a show. The difference is that whereas a show tends to be a one-time deal, usually around 15 minutes long, a presentation tends to have a longer window, and instead of the models coming down the runway, they tend to be standing around like mannequins. We aimed for the beginning of Fall 2009 fashion week in February 0f 2009, to try to maximize attendance. Noelle would find us a location through her real estate contacts, and the rest of us would work on different production aspects.

In the meantime, my friend Ferris and I shot what would be the Fall 2009 collection on our friend, Summer. Another friend, Emem, designed a lookbook for me.