This spring, Fashion That Works Production completed their first major project in collaboration with Iona College - a prominent university in New Rochelle. Born out of Custom Collaborative’s Fashion That Works cooperative development program, Fashion that Works Production (FTWP) is a worker-owned cooperative run by four CC Training Institute graduates. In an effort to mitigate mask shortages, Board member Manon Clavel Solender and Entrepreneurship Coach Veronica Jones fostered a relationship between FTWP and Iona College that will far outlive the pandemic.

This month was all about Sustainability and Environmental Justice, and CC ambassador Kendall Atkinson (@theprply) focused on that exact topic in her article Sustainability is a Spiritual Practice. It focuses on the idea that we as a society have to change our perspective in order for any change to occur.

Dominique Drakeford is an influencer, writer, public speaker, community organizer, educator, and soon-to-be mother. This month, she’s Custom Collaborative’s first ever Guest Newsletter Editor. Everything she does, she does with style. “My passions are education, advocacy, creating ecosystems and looking good while doing it!” she says.

Marcela Peralta remembers watching black and white films with her grandmother as a young girl, commenting on the characters’ ensembles. She doesn’t even remember the plot of most of them. “Me and her, we’d watch them just for the fashion,” she said. “She taught me so much about style.”

Mireille Villarqui is an actress, a baker, a speaker of five languages, and now… a seamstress and clothing designer. In January, she decided she wanted more and quit her job as a chef’s assistant. “I got tired of having these remedial social conversations, just surface level stuff,” she explained. “I don’t have a surface level life.”

“I’ve always considered myself an inventor,” she says.

The name Shakimono means “she who dances with the spirit of her ancestors.” Shakimono (or Sha) was given that name by her husband during a Yoruba Initiation ceremony to embody her powerful ancestral spirit and groundedness. “God is a goddess, god is the earth. Had she not been there and given me a vision, there would be no Shakimono,” she explained. “It keeps me from being normal. That name is more important to me than anything.”

In late winter, the bustling streets of New York City fell silent in the wake of coronavirus, only a few nurses and EMTs could be seen. Among the essential workers, Regina Madison took to the streets early every morning near her home in Washington Heights to walk, stretch, and pray. At 64, she braved the infectious outside world in order to prepare herself mentally and physically for a full day of online learning, sewing, and grieving loved ones lost to the virus.

Isabel, a graduate of CC’s first virtual Training Institute, was born and raised in Ecuador to fashion-minded parents. Her mother was a clothing designer and her father a shoemaker. She always hoped to follow in their footsteps. “It’s my passion,” she explained, “my plan with my husband was to have a laundromat and do alterations, to have my own online store.” Isabel’s aspirations remain strong, but the pandemic has presented immense challenges for her and her family.

Designer Mara Hoffman and Custom Collaborative will join together to develop the work currently underway in our advanced training program and incubator. The goal of this partnership is to provide a case study for scaling the initiatives that both create job opportunities, which further women's economic advancement, and contribute to circular models.