Meet Ginger Nichelle

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Ginger Nichelle. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Ginger below.

Ginger , so excited to have you with us today. So much we can chat about, but one of the questions we are most interested in is how you have managed to keep your creativity alive.
Keeping my creativity alive can be a tricky process. I spend so much time planning for creativity that sometimes it seems like I am being creative for all the wrong reasons. However, I always remind myself that everything I do is creative, from deciding which photos to use in my website, to writing the product descriptions, to picking fabrics, to creating patterns, and sewing to answering emails. Everything that I do for my clothing brand is a creative task, and planning out my creative tasks only keeps me organized. This way, I can realistically plan out my weeks and months, so that I can check off the tasks I complete. There are also times that I truly create things a certain way just because I want to. For example, this year, I really wanted to create a swim collection again, but I was late releasing it. Normally, I would be upset that I was a season late, but honestly, I didn’t mind this time. I wanted to create something that I wanted to create, so even if it doesn’t sell t hat much right now, I will still have it available early for next summer. I just remind myself that I’m doing all of this because I enjoy fashion and love working in everything that deals with fashion. I feel as though the only way to keep creativity alive is to truly love what you do, even if very few people like my vision, I know I created something I love.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
As the CEO and creative director of my brand I spend my time doing everything for my brand. I am a one woman brand that handles everything for my brand. Most of the time, people are shocked that I do so much for my brand, because people have told me they expected me to have several employees working under me. Which I am building up to, but for now I do everything. I design, pattern draft or drape, pattern grade all the sizes, sew, edit photos, pack orders, send out newsletters, handle all the social media, and update my website. Every aspect of my business is funded and run by me. This means that everything I do is a passion of mine and I absolutely love what I do. I would say what’s most exciting about my brand is that I can use the knowledge I have gained from school and working the the fashion industry for over 10 years to know what to do and more importantly, not do with my brand. I may not have the marketing team as the bigger brands, but I do get to witness company moral, and operations that I can apply to my brand. I can make connections so I can in the future hire these people for my own brand or ask if they know someone in their network that could work with me. A great example of this was a pattern maker I worked with over 10 years ago, she was able to connect me with a seamstress I was able to hire to sew the photoshoot samples for my last few collections. I just launched a new dress collection that is very different from my previous collections because I did not use any prints in this collection, only solid color fabrics. I also added full length dresses instead of just knee length so I could reach other customers. I am listening to the feedback of my customers and people who have supported my brand and they truly gave me a new perspective that helped launch this collection. I was inspired by the colors in nature and the different types of flowers I experienced while traveling last year. I’m very excited about this collection because I was able to collaborate with a shoe designer Vanitie’z. Our collections blended together beautifully and we are already working on our next collaboration photoshoot!

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
I would say the areas that were most impactful in my journey as a brand owner were: staying true to myself, learning whatever I could about running brand and being open to doing things differently to change with the times, and really having a strong support system in place to keep me going. I would give everyone this advise as they move forward into their journey as a brand or even just into something artistic in general. There is room for everyone’s creativity, so staying true to your vision, even if people say they don’t understand it will only keep you going. When I started figuring out my brand’s aesthetic, I was always into Japanese street fashion, Harajuku fashion, and Barbie, over the years my aesthetic has consistently stayed within that box, but not everyone understands it, but that’s ok for me, because when people meet me and see me, they completely get it. Working in the fashion industry on the corporate side for over 12 years has allowed me to learn a lot. Yes, I went to school, but I know not everyone can or needs to go to school, but I think everyone will need to learn from somewhere, whether it be a book, a mentor, or first hand experience. There is so much that I don’t know but I’m learning because I have a mentor, I read books and continually work in the fashion industry to broaden my knowledge so that I can expand my brand. My support system is my back bone. They are the people I go to when I am feeling low or unsure of what to do next with my brand. You will need these people in your life. People to hype you up, recommend you for work, inspire you, and etc… The people I have in my life are wonderful and I couldn’t ask for a better support system of my family and friends. They are always helping me the best they can and supporting me however they can. They may not be able to buy something from me every month, but they will share my posts, interact with my posts on social media so it helps the algorithm and etc… These people in your life will do nothing but help you and keep you up when you are feeling discouraged.

What is the number one obstacle or challenge you are currently facing and what are you doing to try to resolve or overcome this challenge?
I would say that a challenge I have is being shy on camera. I know I have a YouTube, but being camera is very difficult for me because I am very shy. It’s hard for me to just pull out my camera and talk on Tiktok about what I’m doing. I know most people want to see the behind the scenes work, but it is always awkward for me to set up my camera and just film myself working because I feel so shy. I’m working on it though, because I know people love looking at the behind the scenes footage. How I’m getting around it is setting up my camera when I am sewing and having the camera just focus on the project and just doing a voice-over explaining what I’m doing. I’m slowly trying to get in front of the camera, I feel once I get over my stage freight, I will be better.

Contact Info:

Image Credits
https://www.instagram.com/blackwell.photos/

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