Suzanne Rae
Suzanne Rae is a New York based ready-to-wear and shoe line made for the “progressive and modern individual”. Her brand is “rooted in feminist fundamentals”. She sees fashion as a performative art, finding a balance between sophistication, playfulness, and functional. She focuses on social awareness and environmental responsibility, sourcing her materials sustainably and working with family-owned factories.
We love how passionate you are about your feminist approach, what made you decide to base your business around this?
Before I went into fashion I was entertaining several potential career paths, including medicine (another long story); while I was studying for the MCATs I found myself turning to and finding comfort in fashion (magazines and sketching), which made me question why I was drawn to fashion and its significance beyond its perceived superficiality. I decided to explore fashion with the intention of proving, to myself perhaps more importantly than to others, that there is value in fashion. And for me that value was most clearly distinguished through the feminist dialectic that I had acquired at Bryn Mawr. I wanted to prove that being interested in fashion didn’t mean that one was necessarily more vain or less intellectual than the next. Through a feminist lens I could open up discussions about and better understand how one chooses to dress, the social implications as well as the influences, including those of systemic biases to gender, class and race. I wanted to learn better how to embrace individuality, challenge the status quo, and eventually share the values that I discovered along the way.
We know you have worked on art projects and community efforts to support feminism; can you tell us a little bit more about some of these? In what ways do they support feminism?
Whatever we decide to do, we ultimately want to do or be better. When we do art projects or work with the community, we engage in enriching discussions or exercises where we learn from each other and enhance our understanding of what feminism means or how we can all be feminists. For example, when we worked with Mae Elvis Kaufman on several of our campaigns, the exercise involved identifying, deconstructing, recontextualizing and reclaiming certain tropes, like the housewife, the old spinster, the construction worker, or even the fashion blogger. Dismantling these socially constructed notions opened up enlightening and productive discussions that we hope, in the final photos, does the same for our audience. Another example is when we did an embroidery workshop with some women at a shelter. While I taught some of the women embroidery basics, some of them taught me more advanced, beautiful techniques. And then we embroidered empowering text, exchanging different words, song lyrics or poems. I only hope they gained from that experience as much as I did. Creating these connections with women in our communities, exchanging stories and ideas, and finding common ground is at the heart of the feminist movement.
You do so much to be sustainable and socially conscious and in many ways, set the bar for how a company should act, what would you tell a company that refuses to incorporate even one of these aspects into their business model?
I don’t know that we set the bar, but I do believe in going for that North Star (of course, once researched and identified), so that if we do fall short we are still high and can try again. Perhaps for those companies that don’t aim so high, maybe they need to reassess their goals and reasons for existence. If it’s simply to make money at the expense of all else, I suggest they reconsider sooner than later; I think they will suffer in the end as consumers, especially the younger generations who will soon have much of the buying power, become smarter and care more about sustainability.
How do you think your brand has impacted society?
I don’t know. I live in a bubble. Sometimes I feel like the tree that fell in the forest that nobody heard. But maybe in some way, I’d like to think that I made feminism less taboo. When I started my line over 10 years ago, my own peers were telling me that maybe I should reconsider using the words feminist or feminism because they could be a turn off. Well, now here we are, and it’s quite the opposite. If I had any part in that transition, even a tiny part, I would be so happy.
We know how much you have done for women, including your partnerships with Girls Inc. and WIN, where does this passion for supporting and empowering women come from?
It’s a sense of duty, really; my parents always worked with communities, so it just seems like something I ought to be doing regularly, like going to church or something. And honestly I’d like to do more of it but recently I admit to having less time between the growth of the brand and the growth of my own family. But I’ll get back to it. It’s amazing how big an impact every effort makes.
Where did you get inspiration for your Feminist Collection? How do you want this collection to impact society?
For my FW17 collection, I started thinking about the old boys club and preppy culture and how I, as a woman of color, would never properly belong to these old clubs. So I wanted to create an all inclusive club and developed our feminist crest. (Photo attached). And then it sort of grew slowly from there.
You preach slow fashion because of how sustainable it is, does this at all affect your business and profit margin? In other words, because you tell your customer to invest in your clothing instead of making many frequent purchases, are you still able to run a successful business?
Of course. People will always need shoes and clothes. And buying a few items every season is not excessive compared to the heaps of clothing and shoes people spend on fast fashion a season. That’s wasteful. The amount of money in total for all those unsustainable, poorly constructed garments that are usually worn only a few times before they’re found in a landfill, is way more than the cost of a couple pairs of great shoes and a few key wardrobe items you can buy from us or any other brand that offers ethically, thoughtfully and well constructed pieces.
What advice would you give a company who is trying to become more sustainable and socially responsible? Where would you tell them to start?
Start by writing down your values, so that all your decisions down the road can go back to those core values. It’s easy to feel lost and confused at moments, but having those values will keep on your path.
What is your motto in life?
Do the right thing. Like the Spike Lee movie. It’s not only right, it’s cool too.
What are your socials?
“You can find me on Instagram at @suzanneraebk.
Sarah Tota, Contributor, PhotoBook Magazine
Tearsheets by Destina Marotta, Contributor, PhotoBook Magazine
