New brand empowers teen fashion designers through creativity and business
My wife Kelly Sparks is design director at Epic Sky, a new fashion brand that's all about empowering young teen and tween girls. Rather than just trying to guess what young people want in clothes, Epic Sky is working with hypertalented teenage designers to develop the collections, and a wide network of teens and tweens to vet the products and contribute content to their site. This past Sunday, the San Francisco Chronicle ran a big spread about the company. Congrats to co-founders Monika Rose and Marian Kown, Kelly, and all the badass women at Epic Sky! From the SF Chronicle:
"We're all about empowerment and positivity," says Kwon. "There are a lot of media messages about girls being perfect - that they're not smart or pretty enough, while our mission is to inspire the epic in every girl. You don't have to have a perfect body or be the most athletic, which is the pressure a lot of middle school girls face. Snapchat and Instagram put a lot of pressure on girls, too."
"We offer clothes that fit girls and go beyond stereotypes," says Rose. "As a mom, I want a brand I can say yes to - clothes that are appropriate for girls' changing bodies and don't promote early sexualization. On the market now, you go from a one-piece Speedo to a Brazilian thong, and there's no option in-between for these girls." Whereas Epic Sky bikinis, designed by Sausalito 17-year-old Antje Worring, actually look like they'd be comfortable and fun to swim in, not just lie around and look glamorous...
The way this crowd-sourced model works is that girls ages 10 to 18 from anywhere submit designs to Epic Sky, and every two weeks the team reviews the submissions. Once a design is chosen, "We bring them in, work with them, and they work with our designer to come up with a prototype, and the girls learn how to bring a product to market," Kwon explains. "They bring the creativity, and it becomes a co-creation."
"Epic Sky's girl-powered fashion" (SF Chronicle)
Epic Sky (EpicSky.co)
