Since 2018, I’ve been offering a service to private clients called “Wardrobe Therapy” where I reconfigure clothing from their wardrobes that they love, but don’t wear, yet can’t get rid of. The process begins with an extensive interview into their relationship with fashion—past, present, and future. We talk about the fashion phases they’ve been through, how, when, where, and why they shop, and what’s missing from their wardrobes today. We talk about how they want clothing to relate to the body; where it should be loose, where it should be fitted, and if they would ever wear a three-quarter length sleeve (9/10 say “no!”)
I am not a licensed therapist, so “Affirmation Not Prescription” is a guiding principle within the Wardrobe Therapy process. I do not give advice to clients on how they should/shouldn’t dress, and I try to refrain (to the best of my ability) from resolving the fashion contentions. Instead, my aim is to hold space for my clients to “speak their truth about fashion”—the things they know about themselves, intuitively, but perhaps had never uttered aloud. (I am a certified yoga instructor, so I am qualified to “hold space”, at least.)
After the interview, we look over the garments they’ve brought to consider for reconstruction—I will work with 3-5 garments from the client, so typically people have 5-8 to choose between. Together we decide which pieces to work with and what they will become. I photograph the garments “before” then I do the work of cutting, sewing, and reconfiguring their garments into new and better forms. If possible, we do a mid process fitting, just to ensure the fit and aesthetic of the garment(s) is in line with the clients desires. Once the pieces are finished, I photograph the “after” and present the garments to the client. Et voila! That’s Wardrobe Therapy.
After six years of this practice, I’ve worked with over 100 clients, each one with a different background, experience, style, desire, shape, size, and pile of materials to work with. Every client is different—and even working with the same client twice, the set of circumstances is different. That’s the beauty of the human experience, and the transformative power of textiles. Anything can become anything. Pants can become jackets. T-shirts can become pants. Dresses can become jumpsuits. A stack of tea towels can become a blouse. I love how unexpected and refreshing Wardrobe Therapy can be. I am often inspired by the work I create for my clients, and incorporate new ideas and innovations into my own practice, JRAT, which could not have been discovered or conceived without Wardrobe Therapy. It demands a level of problem solving and ingenuity that brings forward unpredictable solutions, because the components I’m working with are unpredictable. I don’t know what my clients have experience, I don’t know what they’ve collected, and I don’t know what they want: until we have a conversation about it all.
Looking forward to how I will be running this Substack, I hope it will be a repository for some of the Wardrobe Therapy narratives I’ve gathered in private, that my clients are willing to share publicly. As well as a space to process the insights I’ve gathered and correlations I’ve made after working with so many different people from across the USA and world. I also hope to use this platform as a venue to talk about my personal thoughts, feelings, experiences, histories, and convictions around fashion. I’m grateful to finally be investing in a social media platform where the main focus isn’t about “selling!” Or “self-promoting!” But instead expressing, contemplating, connecting, and transforming the seemingly mundane act of getting dressed, into the potently political and emotional communicative tool that it is. So thanks for being here.