Nanette Lepore

Nanette Lepore

Nanette Lepore

As a young girl growing up in Ohio, Nanette Lepore had the most stylish trolls in town. Apart from stitching up mini-wardrobes for her mythical friends, the young Lepore showed an early knack for design with fashion shows she staged herself. “I took an old blanket when I was a little girl and cut it apart,” says the designer now known for her vintage-inspired, feminine ensembles. “I turned the sheet into a toga and made my neighbor model it in the front yard. That was the first big design.”

By the time she reached sixth grade,
Lepore was begging her mother for sewing lessons. Though she would eventually become boss of the needle and thread, Lepore admits that during her first few classes, “everything was kind of miserable for me. I remember making the ugliest pair of pants in some hideous shade of cobalt blue.”

But as Lepore grew as a designer, she found beauty all around. “Early on, I did a lot of visiting museums. I’d try to analyze art and figure out trends,” she explains. “Then, I moved onto watching movies and I was doing a ton of vintage shopping.” Though she still combs the vintage racks like a pro, Lepore says her design inspiration has become less abstract over the years. “Now I realize I’m only interested in the things I want to wear,” she says. “If I go vintage shopping and buy 30 things and two go into my closet, those are the two things I find most inspiring.”

Also inspiring: the idea that other people want to wear what she designs. “If I’m with my sister or husband, when we see someone wearing my clothes they’ll say, this is Nanette!,” Lepore says. “I get really embarrassed.” Still, she admits, “The first time that happened I got really excited. I still get excited.”

When it came to designing her latest collection, Lepore has a whole roster of fashiony muses. “Here’s what I’m loving for fall,” she states. “The adorable, knitted, sparkly sweater dresses which are short and sort of boxy... I’m loving prints in blush purples with browns and rust. I also love mixed velvets—there’s a great velvet smock dress which is very glamorous and chic.” In terms of her spring
collection, Lepore says to look out for “a very gorgeous mix of colors that are really anchored in deep olives and deep grays.”

In late October, Lepore opens the doors to her first Chicago boutique, giving Windy City girls a brand new place to score killer designer fashions that will help ward off the chill. “What’s exciting about Chicago is that most of my shops are in warmer climates,” Lepore says. “So Chicago will be a fun, more
wintry business.”
-Jennifer Berg

FACTIO MAGAZINE: How would you describe your style as a designer - are you mostly self-taught? Is it part innate or do you have a mentor/good schooling?
NANETTE LEPORE: A lot of the design development has happened over years of doing it. In the beginning, it's very insecure as a designer and you worry you're going to run out of ideas and then you reach a point as a designer where you realize it's just endless and you can keep expanding and coming up with new, new, new. It's a process and a developmental growth, luckily for me my business grew slowly and I was able to grow with the company to achieve more as I went along.

FM: What should we know about your fall collection?
NL: Here's what I'm loving for fall: the adorable knitted sparkly sweater dresses, which are short and sort of boxy with sequins. I'm loving the color stories - a lot of the prints are blush purples with browns and rust. The mixed velvet - there's a great velvet smock dress which is very glamorous and chic. I'm loving the prints that's in the baroquey-style like wallpaperish almost and a paisley wild psychedelic print. It's all a luxe mix of colors such as purples, lavenders, and browns and rusts.

FM: What are some designs we can look forward to in your spring collection?
NL: Still a very gorgeous mix of colors, really grounded and anchored with deep olives and deep grays to tone down your brights. Very feminine and almost grown up modern, but at the same time young and fun.

FM: What was the first store to carry your pieces and what was the feeling like to see people buy your clothing?
NL: I believe it was probably Barney's Co-op and it was really really fun to go in there and see my clothing was in there and it was selling! It was moving off the racks and I'd go in there and there'd be nothing there and the next day we'd get a re-order.

FM: Regarding the creative process, how difficult is it to find a balance between the business aspect along with artistic aspect considering everything is so time sensitive based on the seasons?
NL: As far as the business goes, I don't really have to pay attention to bills and money because I have my husband and we have an amazing bookkeeping department. It's my responsibility to keep us timely. I'm realizing it's a miracle that I'm able to do it because I'm very disorganized (laughs). I have a new design director and it will really make a change of how we do things. We've stayed on a timeline remembering ‘oh, today's the day we need to order that fabric’ but it's never popped up on your computer -- it pops up in my head like "oh yeah, we have to do that" and I'm always last minute, too. I'm usually working on the line the night before it's due so hopefully I’ll be able to get myself in a more efficient timely mode. It's worked out ok so far, we don't ever miss our deadlines, but we cut it close.

FM: Where do you design - is there a specific place in your studio? What's your creative process like?
NL: Often times I’ll sketch at my desk or at a pattern maker's table when we're discussing something. One of my biggest designs- a great top I sketched it on a napkin and handed it over to the patternmaker. It became the perfect top and it lasted forever! I have a patternmaker whose been with us for about ten years who only wants the messiest artiest sketch she can get her hands on because she has fun interpreting it in her own manner. Often times, what you make isn't pretty so you have to start over with it on a mannequin - working in front of a mirror with a garment on a dress maker dummy and that's where it really happens. When things are finished and they're not cute - that's when the really hard part of becoming a designer kicks in because taking something that's from not attractive and figuring out what's wrong with it and figuring out the one little thing to make it perfect, that's a skill I've honed over the years.

FM: Do you ever find that you can't shut it off? For instance waking in Madison Ave. looking in some of the store windows, is it hard not looking at fashion thinking “I could design that or get inspired by it”?
NL: I can shut it off, but it is a constant thing, actually I can but I can't. If we take a weekend away or a vacation - one time a year, I take a family vacation in May and don't let myself shop. But every other trip I take is usually based around a flea market or a shopping trip in another city.

FM: Describe a day in the life - is everyday really different or are there some days better than others?
NL: I think that everyday you discover something new; fashion gets a rosy picture painted but you have to have nerves of steel and be a bulldog to be in this business. Everyday is a new problem, everyday something new arises that you couldn't possibly think would happen and it does - not just in design but when you have to maintain your business and do your production. The design part was so minor for me so it got the least amount of attention so now that my business has grown and I have a huge staff of over 120 people in NYC, there's a lot of support. I'm able to design. Before that it was more about keeping the business running, making sure the clothing fit, making sure the cutting room didn't cut the wrong fabric, a pant you didn't need, etc. Things like that happen constantly in this business so that's what I was dealing everyday for the first ten years - keep the mistakes from happening.

FM: How did you get through it? What gave you the stamina to persist? I would imagine so many people would give up at that point.
NL: In the beginning, I was over $100,000 in debt and I had my own company for a few years, but I wasn't well known enough to get a job as a big design director making a huge salary, so I knew the only way to pay back the debt was to stay in business and make the company profitable - out of fear and panic – it was money my dad loaned because he had mortgaged his house…There was a lot of pressure and I had to make it work. Also, I love it! In the end as much as its torture and pain, I love the idea that you've made this thing with your hands. The idea of creating something from nothing, from a swatch of fabric and the process it goes through even though it’s tedious and difficult and it's very rewarding when you see it completely finished with the process that starts 8 months in advance. It’s such a long process with so many things going on but at the same time it's an amazing thing.

FM: Do you wear your own designs a lot?
NL: I do, lately I've been mixing it up and letting myself buy other designers because it's ok now because I love shopping. I hated the idea for years I couldn't shop. Now I can afford to buy designer things so I’m doing it and I enjoy it.

FM: How do you see your business progressing?
NL: We're happily feeling like we have started to understand the footwear business so there's tons of growth potential there and next would be handbags. I just want to expand the line and fill in with a line of basics like more jeans...building on what I have and trying to get my infrastructure in my company to do that and then more retail, more stores in Europe and more overseas growth.
--Vicki Salemi