Pearls in gowns project
I had the incredible opportunity to work at the Children's Hospital of Oakland through high school. After being able to work with the patients, I realized I wanted to help make their days hopeful and happier. I found that my best way was to achieve this was to provide contributions to the Hands of Hope, a foundation whose focus is too encourage children to keep hope and faith, even if the road to recovery sometimes feel long and impossible.
Ergo, I found a reason to do what I love most: designing dresses for a cause.
BRIEF
SIMPLIFYING
Through this project, I had two goals: create classic dresses which would push girls to feel confident in themselves and to simplify standard dresses, removing the annoying aspects of wearing a dress. With funding from Baxter and Highfive, passionate friends, and a meaningful end goal in mind, I had a gut feeling this project had the possibility to make an actual impact of my community.
PROCESS
STITCHIN' UP ISSUES WITH STANDARD DRESSES
By talking to friends about problems they face with dresses, looking at my own pains with wearing dresses, and reading reviews on reviews which critiqed different styles of dresses, I realized there were multiple problems within dresses which I could easily conquer.
To look for inspiration, I tried to find similarities in the day to day dresses that were my friends go to dresses and implement it into my dresses designs. After much prototyping and refining, I realized I had figured out the answer to making the "comfortable, go-to dress" while at the same time making it stylish and unique. When I asked people about their experiences within it, they all told me the same thing: it was shockingly comfortable and easy to wear.
When it came to achieving my second goal-- creating a dress which pushed the wearer to be their most confident self-- was a challenge that was a lot more difficult to achieve. I tried to use certain colors that symbolize "being bold" and kept designs simple and elegant to promote people to be their simplest and most honest selves, but to me that wasn't enough for pushing this idea of confidence. I realized through looking at other companies, like TOMS, that in order to promote a concept, I had to tell a story that people would find inspiration from.
RESULTS
A NEW TYPE OF DRESS
The Pearls in Gowns dresses are like no other, removing any issue that you might face with wearing the day to day dress. The fabrics of each dress is interwoven with a a unique story of confidence. (check out each story on Brave Stories). The dresses themselves are also maximized towards comfort. The dresses are stain resistant, easily wearable (zippers on sides instead of the unreachable parts of a girl's back),and have built in padding, to avoid the struggles of loose strapless bras & unsticky adhesive bras. My journey started with began with helping my community and ended with many learning lessons, a stronger understanding of the design process, and a 10k check written to the Hands of Hope program,
Ergo, I found a reason to do what I love most: designing dresses for a cause.
BRIEF
SIMPLIFYING
Through this project, I had two goals: create classic dresses which would push girls to feel confident in themselves and to simplify standard dresses, removing the annoying aspects of wearing a dress. With funding from Baxter and Highfive, passionate friends, and a meaningful end goal in mind, I had a gut feeling this project had the possibility to make an actual impact of my community.
PROCESS
STITCHIN' UP ISSUES WITH STANDARD DRESSES
By talking to friends about problems they face with dresses, looking at my own pains with wearing dresses, and reading reviews on reviews which critiqed different styles of dresses, I realized there were multiple problems within dresses which I could easily conquer.
To look for inspiration, I tried to find similarities in the day to day dresses that were my friends go to dresses and implement it into my dresses designs. After much prototyping and refining, I realized I had figured out the answer to making the "comfortable, go-to dress" while at the same time making it stylish and unique. When I asked people about their experiences within it, they all told me the same thing: it was shockingly comfortable and easy to wear.
When it came to achieving my second goal-- creating a dress which pushed the wearer to be their most confident self-- was a challenge that was a lot more difficult to achieve. I tried to use certain colors that symbolize "being bold" and kept designs simple and elegant to promote people to be their simplest and most honest selves, but to me that wasn't enough for pushing this idea of confidence. I realized through looking at other companies, like TOMS, that in order to promote a concept, I had to tell a story that people would find inspiration from.
RESULTS
A NEW TYPE OF DRESS
The Pearls in Gowns dresses are like no other, removing any issue that you might face with wearing the day to day dress. The fabrics of each dress is interwoven with a a unique story of confidence. (check out each story on Brave Stories). The dresses themselves are also maximized towards comfort. The dresses are stain resistant, easily wearable (zippers on sides instead of the unreachable parts of a girl's back),and have built in padding, to avoid the struggles of loose strapless bras & unsticky adhesive bras. My journey started with began with helping my community and ended with many learning lessons, a stronger understanding of the design process, and a 10k check written to the Hands of Hope program,