SUCRÉ
A sweet and delectably-playful mini collection
August 2022
On May 23rd, 2022, I tweeted: “Before I turn 20, I’m gonna drop a collection.”
My birthday is in August, so this timeline gave me less than three months to achieve my goal. I grew up sewing and mending garments by hand, inspired over and over again by my seamstress lineage. But I had never executed a project of this scale in such a short amount of time; much less a highly-intentional collection intended to conclude my second decade of life. This sudden urge and ambition to create something meaningful lit a fire within me. I had a deep inclination to begin my third decade of life with this project. So I did. On August 8th, 2022, I posted nine final posters.
SUCRÉ, French for 'sweet,' was heavily inspired by this birthday theme. My imagery, textures, designs, and creative direction drew heavy inspiration from Valentine’s Day conversation hearts, gummy candy, candy necklaces, Ring Pops, and fizzy drinks; All of which brought playfulness, nostalgia, and dreamy, child-like themes to the final product. Everything began with simple sketches and color palettes. I wanted SUCRÉ to be colorful yet sophisticated, and for the garments’ designs to speak for themselves. I soon began sourcing my labels and textiles. Next, I drafted patterns. After that, I began fitting with my models and booked some studio time to shoot. I made sure to bring a film camera on set because I knew I would want to remember these moments. This was a day of many personal firsts: My first time creative directing, my first time styling, my first time in the studio, my first true collection.
The photo editing process was arguably the best part. After the photoshoot, I dove into my graphic design skills, adding gradients, graphics, logos, lettering. My ideas were manifesting themselves into the creative vision I had back in May. I am exceedingly pleased with the final results.
Thank you Catherine for doing the girls’ nails, I LUV YA 2 PIECES
Puffy Star Dress/Who is Elaine to Me?
A project paying homage to my grandmother; My teacher, angel & matriarch
January 2023
One of my favorite elements from SUCRÉ was a stuffed star I tied around one of my models. I had a couple prototypes lying around, so I played with them, styling each with a variety of complimentary colors and textures. It became a game. How many ways can one thing be repurposed? How can I make my garments more versatile and original? I experimented with more stuffed stars. Fur puffy stars became an immediate favorite. My love for them eventually gave way to my Puffy Star Dress concept: a fun, cushioned dress made up of a bunch of individual puffy stars.
After a couple weeks of sketching, I landed on a design I was really excited about. But, the completion of this sketch meant it was time to breathe deeply through the production of a jillion of these little stuffed stars. And of course I chose a super finicky material to use—I just love doing things the hard way. It was quite the learning curve. My assembly line evolved many times; many episodes of ‘Forensic Files’ were consumed.
After a couple months of production and redirection (and bits of fur EVERYWHERE), I decided to shoot the dress incomplete. It was quite difficult for me to move on without reaching the creative summit I had envisioned, but as most creative endeavors do, the idea continued to evolve. The lengthy execution time made me ponder the Elaine identity. In the end, the final product was less about a dress and more about the journey, artistically answering the personal question: Who is Elaine to Me?
