The Creative Cookie

Fashion Fridays with Joanna Featuring Stella Jean

Gareth  Cattermolegetty Photos

In this week of Fashion Fridays With Joanna, we are gonna take a look at Haitian-Italian designer, Stella Jean. Stella is a member of the Italian Chamber of Fashion and the only member of Afro-European background. Living and working in Rome, Jean is considered to be Giorgio Armani's protégé.

Stella Jean was born in 1979 and raised in Rome to a Haitian mother, Violette Jean, and an Italian father, Marcello Novarino. She studied political science at the Sapienza University of Rome before dropping out. Growing up biracial in Rome, she and her family received stares from people and even harsh words. “Italy wasn’t ready,” she said  “I felt Italian, but other people didn’t allow me to be it.” From ages 16 to 18, she tried identifying as Haitian. Haitians knew she wasn’t, but they asked fewer questions about her family tree so she felt more at ease, which pushed her to study her mother’s homeland and its history, culture, and art.

CAREER

Not much is known about her personal life but her work presents her love of learning different cultures and interpreting them into her designs. Stella’s story was no overnight success. The self-taught Italian-Haitian designer failed to qualify for Vogue Italia’s ’s talent competition "Who Is On Next". Her luck seemed to have kicked in during her third try because she not only qualified but also won. She won the support of industry heavyweights, such as Suzy Menke, and most of all, Giorgio Arman, who personally selected her Spring/Summer 2014 collection to show at his 550-seat Teatro Armani show space in Milan, as well as lending his communications team. This opportunity was huge for Stella because it was the first time Armani has ever shared the stage with another designer. For Jean's spring/summer 2014 collection, she collaborated with the International Trade Centre's Ethical Fashion Initiative. As a result, the printed fabrics for this collection were sustainably sourced, hand-crafted, and aimed at helping trade workers in disadvantaged communities in Africa. Jean's designs have also attracted the attention of Louboutin and been worn by the likes of Beyoncé, Rihanna, and Zendaya over the years. She also collaborated on shoes with Christian Louboutin for her AW14 collection, which featured her first menswear collection.

 

Stella Jean with a local artisan in Benin. (Forbes 2019)

 

Since 2013, Jean has traveled to Haiti, Burkina Faso, Mali, Kenya, Bein, and Peru to design a capsule collection that she presents at Milan Fashion Week each Fall. When asked by an interviewer from Forbes Magazine in 2019 if she had any specific goals she planned to accomplish with her designs and her strategy of incorporating the different cultures into her designs, “I use fashion as a tool to fight against any cultural segregation.” She also said, “For me, fashion is very conceptual. I want to share ideas and tell stories through my work...To create a sort of marriage between my Italian background and international patterns in order to produce something that has a mixed origin, one with its own distinctive identity: something local that aspires to the global.” In the article with Forbes, she also gives some examples of the different cultures that she was informed of. “In Benin, for example, the people produce a beautiful, hand-loomed fabric.” She even mentioned the things she learned from her mother’s home in Haiti. Jean discovered a longstanding tradition of decorative metalwork and wondered if she could adapt it into jewelry. Together with local artisans, she designed metal bangles that depict various aspects of Haitian culture. In her recent 2020 collection, she incorporated eye-catching African prints and classic Italian fabrics. Bold prints, floral crochet embroidery, Haitian-inspired motifs, and a touch of simplicity are woven into the pieces. 

Stella Jean is a fashion icon in the making and she's doing it while remaining humble and bringing out the beauty of different cultures into mainstream fashion. When asked why she chose fashion as a career path she stated, “For me, it has begun as a personal necessity. Born in Italy in the late ’70s and struggling–being so diverse from my fellow citizens, has motivated me to find a way to show people not to be afraid of different cultures and colors. But, instead of seeing them as opportunities and as a chance to grow better, together. I use fashion as a tool to fight against cultural segregation. The beauty of fashion has no borders. This allows me to ‘talk’ through fashion without preconceived opinions. Just beauty.”

True to her heritage, Stella Jean is compassionate about inclusion and uplifting the vulnerable and voiceless. For each collection, she collaborates with Laboratorio di Sartoria Sociale Coloriage, an atelier in Rome where migrants and those seeking asylum develop skills and work on creative projects. The fabrics used for the turbans in this collection were sustainably sourced in Mali, Ghana, and Ivory Coast and assembled at Coloriage (stellajean.it).

It’s also important to note that she is the first and only Italian fashion designer to take to the stage at a BLM protest (this took place in June of 2020) and to, in her own words, publicly denounce the existence of racial discrimination within the country of Italy.

ADDITIONAL FACTS: 

-Her decision to use her mother's maiden name for the brand was in order to equally represent both parts of her heritage; a consideration that is also evident in her collections.

-Jean was studying political science at Sapienza University of Rome, when she dropped out to model for Egon von Fürstenberg, the fashion designer and ex-husband of Diane von Fürstenberg.

-In September 2013, Giorgio Armani - in an unprecedented move - personally selected Jean's spring/summer 2014 collection to show at his 550-seat Teatro show space during Milan Fashion Week.

-Mother of two, and resides in Rome with her children.

-You can find her website here.

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See you next week with another installment!  

The Creative Minds Behind 101 Ways to Love Your Style

“Fashion is a tool you can use to stand out and speak up! The world is changing so it’s a great time to experiment with fashion,” said Lesley Ware of her new book, 101 Ways to Love Your Style. This book is light, colorful, and easy-to-read and would make the perfect gift for anyone interested in fashion! It’s available for pre-order now, but before you purchase it, check out what it felt like to complete this book in the midst of a global pandemic from the creative minds who put it together! 

 

Lesley - author: The silver lining of the pandemic was having the time to sit, think and be creative in new ways.  Thankfully, I’m surrounded by talented people (who love me) so it was easy to assemble a team to bring this book to life! It's funny we never met in person or even had a zoom call together. This post is our first time in the same place.

We will celebrate, with cake, when it's safe:) 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Morgan - graphic designer + illustrator: Working with Lesley on this book was honestly so fun, and I learned and gained so much from it! I looked forward to meeting with her every week on Zoom and chatting about ideas and plans for the design and publication of it. Lesley is such a lovely person and truly a breath of fresh air, and that totally carried into the experience of working on the book with her and within her book itself.

 

 

 

Victor - illustrator: I appreciated the chance to experiment with high contrast on this book. I know nothing about fashion except that it’s very dear to the woman I am married to. It was wonderful to create work based on Lesley’s recommendation but with the ability to fulfill the book’s need in any way I chose.

 

 

 

 

Amy - cover designer: I am so grateful to have collaborated with Lesley and her team on 101 Ways to Love Your Style, especially in the midst of a global pandemic!

Even though we never met in person during this time, I definitely felt everyone’s presence.

 

 

 

 

Kristen - copy editor: Collaborating on a book--on this book!--in the midst of a global pandemic was pretty lovely. The past year has felt rough in various ways--and being able to immerse myself in Lesley's fun and rallying pages gave me a welcome boost. 

 

 

 

 

 

Joanna - publishing intern: Working on this book during the pandemic has been a task for everyone that participated in it. Like many people around the world right now we are still adjusting to working remotely and finding ways to fit a different aspect of our lives and our work life into the perfect mix. Never the less I’ve enjoyed seeing the process and progress that it took for us to complete such an informative project.

Fashion is Self Care with Ooh Baby

Anika Ignozzi, best known as Ooh Baby around the Pittsburgh community is a 23-year-old fashion designer who repurposes clothing with her own unique twist. According to the Ooh Baby website, “Anika brings items back to life with psychedelic faces and abstract objects.” Anika began her work in 2018 and built her business from the ground up. Now, she has a flagship store in Millvale, PA, and is styling celebrities including Bebe Rexha. 

 

Through her years of design, she has gained insight into what it truly means to be yourself. Every time I see her, her hair is a different shade of neon and she is always wearing the brightest outfit she can find. Color is Anika’s best friend. For her, this self-expression and crazy style is what makes her, her. Keep reading to learn what fashion as self-care means to Ooh Baby and check her out on Instagram: @o.o.h.baby.

CC: Tell me a bit about yourself. What do you do? Where are you from? 

OB: I’m Anika Ignozzi and I run Ooh Baby. I’m originally from Lower Burrell but I now live in Pittsburgh and that’s where the Ooh Baby store is. I repurpose clothing; I paint on it and sometimes I rework it. I’m pretty much known for painting on canvas these funky psychedelic faces and then sewing them on the piece.

 

CC: Why do you do what you do? What inspires you?

OB: Honestly I don’t think, at this point, I would be able to do anything else. I just love creating art and I love sharing it with people. I love creating an awesome experience that people can also find inspiration from to follow their own dreams. I love it for so many reasons like meeting all my customers, seeing what they do, and creating different pieces all day. Everything about it is just amazing to me. I couldn’t see it any other way. 

 

CC: What are some of your greatest accomplishments in your work?

OB: For me, my store is my biggest accomplishment because I really wasn’t sure how I was going to hand-paint every piece as opposed to when I was only selling at a flea market on Saturdays and Sundays. Styling some celebrities has been cool and I keep styling more but the biggest one is Bebe Rexha who wore the outfit during the Penn State concert. Not so much anymore, but before COVID I would go to Brooklyn and sell at the flea market and it was really cool to get my foot in the door in a much busier city than Pittsburgh.

 

CC: What is your favorite thing you’ve created? 

OB: The walls in my store are some of my favorite stuff. Aside from that, it would just be the faces in general. I honestly couldn’t pick a specific piece. The patches are my favorite things. 

 

CC: Where do you see Ooh Baby in 10 years? 

OB: I would hope to have another store in a much busier city, whether that be in Paris or New York or LA. I don’t know if that would be the end goal location for me to live, per se, but I would like to have a few shops that I can travel to all the time to help the community wherever the store is. I really want to keep creating one-of-one pieces because I think that’s the most important part.

 

CC: What do you wish you could tell someone who hopes to start their own fashion business? 

OB: Work ethic!! You can say so many things but if you’re not willing to literally put in the work, then nothing is going to work. So, it’s an everyday thing. You have to create, you have to sew or whatever it is; you have to do it every day. Opportunities will start to come because you’re concentrating on it so much. 

 

CC: What is your idea of “fashion as self-care” and why?

OB: Wearing something funky and crazy will bring you more confidence because it’s daring enough that you’re already wearing something so crazy. You will get compliments from random people and people will come up and talk to you. The more you’re able to express yourself and the more comfortable you are with expressing yourself, the easier it is to live and be happy.

Fashion Fridays with Joanna Featuring Ann Lowe

On this week's Fashion Fridays with Joanna, we will be taking a look at  the life of Ann Lowe. Ann Cole Lowe was the first African American to become a noted fashion designer. She was best known for designing the ivory silk taffeta wedding dress worn by Jacqueline Bouvier when she married John F. Kennedy in 1953.


Personal Life

Ann was born in rural Clayton, Alabama, during the Jim Crow era in 1898. She was the great-granddaughter of a slave woman and an Alabama plantation owner. Ann Lowe was born into a lineage of seamstresses who had established their own dressmaking business in Montgomery, Alabama. Lowe's interest in fashion, sewing, and design stem from her mother, Janey, and grandmother, Georgia. Ann’s mother passed when she was 16-years-old. At the time of her death, Lowe's mother had been working on four ball gowns for the First Lady of Alabama, Elizabeth Kirkman O'Neal. Utilizing  the skills she learned from her mother and grandmother, Lowe finished the dresses. In 1912, she married Lee Cohen, with whom she had a son, Arthur Lee. After her marriage, Lowe's husband wanted her to give up working as a seamstress. Lowe left her husband and moved to Florida with her son, becoming a live-in dressmaker for a socialite for ten years. She married for a second time but that marriage also ended. Lowe later said, "My second husband left me. He said he wanted a real wife, not one who was forever jumping out of bed to sketch dresses." Lowe later adopted a daughter, Ruth Alexander.

Career

In 1917, she traveled to New York City to attend sewing courses at S.T. Taylor design School. As the only Black student, she was segregated to a separate room away from her peers. She returned to Tampa in 1919 and saw an opportunity to capitalize on the city’s yearly celebration known as the Gasparilla Ball, where a court and queen is crowned during week-long festivities. The following year, she opened her first dress salon named, Annie Cohen. The salon catered to members of high society and quickly became a success and she saved $20,000 from her earnings. Soon after, Lowe was on her return to New York City in 1928. Ann's reason for returning was for her to fulfill her dream as a fashion designer in the Big Apple. In order to make ends meet, she had to put her independent design career on hold and take jobs designing anonymously for other labels and department stores such as Henri Bendel, Neiman Marcus, Saks Fifth Avenue, and Chez Sonia. In 1946, she designed the dress that Olivia de Havilland wore to accept the Academy Award for Best Actress for To Each His Own, even though the name on the dress was Sonia Rosenberg. As she was not getting credit for her work, Lowe and her son opened a second salon, Ann Lowe's Gowns, on Lexington Avenue in NYC in 1950. Design elements that Ann was known for were her fine handwork, signature flowers, and trapunto technique. When asked to describe herself she would use quotes such as "an awful snob", adding:

"I love my clothes and I'm particular about who wears them.
I am not interested in sewing for cafe society or social climbers. I do not cater to Mary and Sue. I sew for the families of the Social Register."

In 1953, Lowe got the opportunity of a lifetime when she was asked to create the dresses for the entire bridal party of Jacqueline Bouvier’s wedding to senator John F. Kennedy. The opportunity was presented to her by Janet Lee Auchincloss who happened to be the mother of the future First Lady. Though the opportunity helped her career at the time, Ann didn't really benefit from the earnings; she was paid $500. Throughout her career, Lowe continued to work for wealthy clientele who often talked her out of charging hundreds of dollars for her designs. Lowe was paid less than white designers for her custom design work. After paying her staff, she often failed to make a profit on her designs. Lowe later admitted that at the height of her career, she was virtually broke. Upon losing her son and business partner in 1958 to a tragic car accident, she had difficulty making ends meet, ultimately declaring bankruptcy in 1962 after losing her salon in New York City and failing to pay taxes. That same year, her right eye was removed due to glaucoma. Things started looking up again for Ann during the last years of her life when she was able to go under surgery to save her eye. In 1968, she opened a new store, Ann Lowe Originals, on Madison Avenue. She retired in 1972. In the last five years of her life, Lowe lived with her daughter Ruth in Queens. She died at her daughter's home on February 25, 1981, after a lengthy illness. Her funeral was held at St. Mark's United Methodist Church on March 3rd.

                                           

Jackie Kennedy in Ann Cole Lowe
(Photo by Bachrach/Getty Images)

 

Legacy 

Lowe is now recognized as a pioneering African American couturier. Her pieces are preserved in renowned museum collections including the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of the City of New York, and The Museum at FIT. Several others were included in an exhibition on Black fashion at the Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in Manhattan in December 2016. A children’s book, Fancy Party Gowns: The Story of Ann Cole Lowe written by Deborah Blumenthal was published in 2017.

Photographer unknown. Ebony Magazine, Ann Lowe in her Madison Avenue salon, December 1966. Source: Ebony Magazine

 

Fashion is Self Care: Tips From Our Favorite Fashion Pros

Today, I’m thrilled to share with you the best fashion-as-self-care-tips I’ve learned from the creative minds of Bianca Norris, Morgan Hale, Valerie Mayen, Ella Rose Berhe-Lumax, and Mark E. Menzie. Hopefully, these tips will encourage you to shift the way you utilize fashion and open your mind to taking care of yourself with the garments you wear.

Over the past several months, here at The Creative Cookie, we’ve spoken to 5 fashion industry professionals about what fashion as self-care means to them. Personally, I’ve grown all the wiser about turning what I wear into a tool for self-care, and hopefully, you have too. Vanessa Friedman at The New York Times recently released a piece titled “Can Fashion Be a Form of Self-Care?” falling in line with exactly what we’ve been talking about at The Creative Cookie. In the article, she said, “This is turning into a season of swaddling clothes; of adult snugglies and softness; of clothes so squishy they are like a portable form of self-care.” Without the interaction of human touch, why not make the clothes you wear as comfortable and cuddly as possible? Below are some tips from our favorite fashion professionals that you can incorporate into your life!

Fashion as self-care can mean:

1. Anything that brings you healing and joy- According to creative Bianca Norris, “Fashion doesn’t have to mean heels and a sequin top. If your concept of fashion is putting on a sweatsuit and that’s what makes you feel great and comfortable in your own skin, then that’s fashion.” Personal style means something different to everybody and staying true to that style instead of following popular trends is a form of fashion as self-care. 

 

 

2. Comfort- Artist and weaver Morgan Hale said, “Wearing something that feels comfortable on my body makes me confident.” Clothes that make you feel confident are clothes that provide self-care; Morgan found this confidence through jumpsuits and overalls. For her, they are the best way to be comfortable and self-assured. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3. Putting in a little bit of effort- Valerie Mayen, an alumnus of Project Runway told us, “When I take the time to put on real clothes and fix my hair and put on some makeup and be intentional about what I’m wearing, it does make me feel different.” In the midst of this pandemic, it’s so easy to put on sweatpants and get on Zoom without leaving your bed. However, sometimes getting ready like you would pre-pandemic can lift your spirits and give you the push you need to get through the day.

 

 

4. Something fun that you made yourself- One of the many things that the 10-year-old craft expert Ella Rose Berhe-Lumax has created is a yellow scrunchie that simply makes her smile. She said, “It’s just really fun to make them and really easy to make them.” A year into this pandemic, quarantine crafts can still be fun and they can act as a form of self-care when you get to flaunt your creations. 

 

 

 

5. Self-expression- Designer Mark E. Menzie believes that “by expressing myself through fashion and showing the world that this is who I truly am, my confidence, peace of mind, and overall well-being are brought full circle.” By being yourself and owning it in the clothes you are wearing, you are treating yourself well and using fashion as a tool for self-care. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We can all learn a little something from these accomplished fashion professionals! I hope these tips brighten your day, give you a reason to get dressed up, and provide some inspiration for you to utilize fashion as a tool for self-care.

Fashion Fridays with Joanna featuring Coco Chanel

On this week's Fashion Fridays with Joanna, I would like to introduce none other than the iconic and legendary Gabrielle Bonheur, famously known as Coco Chanel.

 

Gabrielle Bonheur or "Coco" Chanel was a French fashion designer and a businesswoman who was the founder and namesake of the iconic Chanel brand. Her influence in fashion continues to stay strong even to this day as her house remains one of the biggest names in fashion.

 

Coco Chanel book cover by Charles-Roux Edmonde

Early life

Gabrielle Bonheur Chanel was born on August 19, 1883 in Saumur, France. Her early years were anything but glamorous. She lived in a very low-poverty area in the countryside of France. She had two brothers and two sisters. Her parents were hard workers; her mother Eugénie Jeanne Devolle worked as a  laundry woman in the charity hospital and her father Albert Chanel was a street vendor who peddled work clothes and undergarments. When Gabrielle was 11-years-old, her mother died at the age of 32. Her father, shortly after, made the decision to send his two sons to work as farm laborers and sent his three daughters to an orphanage. Chanel was raised by nuns who taught her how to sew, a skill that would lead to her life’s work. At age eighteen, Chanel, too old to remain at Aubazine, went to live in a boarding house for Catholic girls. Chanel found employment as a seamstress. When not sewing, she sang in a cabaret where she gained her stage name Coco. Some say that the name comes from one of the songs she used to sing, and Chanel herself said that it was a “shortened version of cocotte, the French word for 'kept woman.' 

 

Beginnings of a Fashion Empire

 

When Coco was in her early 20s, She became involved with a wealthy man named Etienne Balsan, who offered to help her start a millinery business in Paris. She soon left him for one of his wealthier friends, Arthur “Boy” Capel. Both men were instrumental in Chanel’s first fashion venture. It's alleged that she was his mistress. Arthur Edward Capel and Chanel flourished into an affair of their own. Capel was also a very wealthy  man. He financed her first shop on Paris’s Rue Cambon in 1910 where she began selling hats. She later added stores in Deauville and Biarritz and began making clothes. Coco  became a popular figure in the Parisian literary and artistic worlds. She designed costumes for the Ballets Russes and Jean Cocteau’s play Orphée.

Chanel's very popular fragrance

 

In the 1920s, Chanel took her prosperous business to new heights. She launched her first perfume, Chanel No. 5, which was the first to feature a designer’s name. Chanel once explained Perfume:

“Is the unseen, unforgettable, ultimate accessory of fashion. That heralds your arrival and prolongs your departure.”

The fragrance was soon backed by department store owner Théophile Bader and businessmen Pierre and Paul Wertheimer. A deal was ultimately negotiated where the Wertheimer business would take in 70% of Chanel No. 5 profits for producing the perfume at their factories; with Bader receiving 20% and Chanel herself only receiving 10%.

 

 

Iconic Designs

 

In 1925, Chanel introduced one of her legendary pieces, a Chanel suit with a collarless jacket and well-fitted skirt. She brought a new look into women’s fashion by borrowing elements of menswear and emphasizing comfort over the constraints of the-popular fashions. This was a huge step for women’s fashion; she helped women say goodbye to the days of corsets and other confining garments. Another 1920s revolutionary design was Chanel’s little black dress. She took a color once associated with mourning and showed just how chic it could be for evening wear. The Chanel bag was introduced in 1929; it was inspired by the soldiers’ bags.  The international economic depression of the 1930s had a negative impact on Chanel's company. When asked why she closed down shop, she stated that it was not a time for fashion. 

 

The Comeback

 

At the age of 70, in the early 1950s, Chanel made a triumphant return to the fashion world. Chanel presented her new collection on February 5, 1954. Chanel’s collection was criticized harshly by French critics mostly because, during the time of World War II, she was criticized for being too close to the German occupiers to boost her professional career. Her designs did eventually win the hearts of the public. People of all different ages were buying from her collection which was a big win for Chanel. Even First Lady Jackie Kennedy was frequently seen in these designs. 

 

The Death of an Icon

 

On January 10, 1971, Chanel died in her suite at the Hôtel Ritz in Paris where she had resided for more than 30 years. Gabrielle lived her life to the fullest and will forever go  down in history for the changes that she brought to the fashion world. A little more than a decade after her death, designer Karl Lagerfeld took the reins at her company to continue the Chanel legacy, until his death in 2018.  

 

Fun facts:

 

• At birth, Chanel's name was entered into the official registry as "Chasnel".

• Chanel took in the sun a lot, making suntans not only acceptable, but a symbol denoting a life of privilege and leisure.

See you next week with another post. Happy Women's History Month!