Thank goodness my sister was into fashion. She used to order us Esprit catalogs which we'd pour over, learning what was cool at the moment. When we were done with them, we'd pull the pages out and hang them on the walls of the little travel trailer she and I shared as our bedrooms. It opened my eyes to a beautiful world I never knew existed. I thought being a fashion model would be amazing, but I was going through an awkward phase, so I set my sights on being a hand model.
When I was in fourth grade, my family moved deep into the woods outside of the small Northern California town of Yreka. I loved when we'd get to make the trip into town and I could gaze in the windows of my favorite store, Directions. The window displays were always done by a beautiful woman named Yoni, who I admired very much. When I got older, I would pick her brain about how she created those amazing displays. And it's definitely where I learned to appreciate a good display, especially one with cute merchandise.
My mom eventually took a job at a shop in town called the Second Hand Rose, which sold used clothing. It was like a dream come true for me because I got to be in charge of window displays. And sometimes, there wasn't as good of a selection as other times, so I learned to be resourceful with outfit displays, leaning on a few good key pieces to pull the looks together.
Along the way, I met my uncle who was a very successful doctor in San Francisco and I began to visit him on holidays. He shopped in wonderful department stores like Macy's and Saks Fifth Avenue and would take me there to shop, carte blanche. It was a shocking experience for me, as his world and mine could not have been more different. Now I could have the Esprit outfits I had only seen on my travel trailer bedroom walls, never even imagining that one day they could possibly be mine.
When I was just beginning my life as an adult, I'd still order fashion catalogs and would fill out huge orders on the order forms, sometimes taking several days at a time before I was done. Once complete, I'd tuck them away and wait for the next season's catalogs to arrive. For many years I wasn't able to place the orders, but the process made me happy. Like I was in touch with fashion.
I still love seeing each season's collections and look forward to every catalog that arrives. Each season (I break it up by spring/summer and fall/winter) I try to think about one main color I'm going to build my wardrobe around so that everything works well together and my dollar goes farther. For spring/summer this year, I'm loving navy blue. And so many colors look great with Navy.
From Boden. Wouldn't this be a cute start to my navy spring/summer? :
From EmersonMade:
and from Made by Hank (any of these would look so cute with my wardrobe):
And even the color of the year looks great with navy!
Look sis, it's me! I'm a hand model.
