Kalesa and Elena, Founders of Autumn + Bower
Elena and Kalesa of Autumn + Bower
This interview was conducted on July 26, 2016. It was edited for length and clarity.
Brittany: Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
Kalesa: Elena and I met working together at Anthropologie. We both worked for the company for over six years. We only worked together though probably for two. We were both at separate stores. We’re both from the Bay Area. I’m from Livermore. Where is your hometown?
Kalesa: I’m southeast of here and she’s northeast of here. I studied fashion design in San Francisco at the Art Institute and Elena studied graphic design. We both just always wanted to be in fashion in some capacity. I think we probably bonded at work because we both really liked the moment where you get a customer into a certain outfit and you see that look on her face where she feels beautiful and is really excited about the clothes. Specifically when someone takes a risk and maybe they weren't sure, but we convinced them to try something on, and you see them feel really good about themselves. The styling aspect -- helping people find clothes that they like -- was a huge reason why this is working, why we wanted to do this. I left Anthropologie in order to pursue starting a business and Elena was the first person that I thought of that could possibly be willing and crazy enough to do it with me and who would want to and would be really good at it. I will never forget finally meeting with her for a drink to talk about it. I think you had known this was something I had been thinking about. It was a dream where I had been talking about it for a while. Finally we met for a drink to talk about it and I explained the premise I was thinking of. It was something I had been incubating but procrastinating at the same time -- because it’s really scary, right? -- for like two years. I tell Elena about it and she's like -- we’re halfway through the first drink -- “Great, when do we start?” (Laughs) I was like, “This means... Oh my god, I have to do it. Somebody else is going to do this with me. I have to actually make this happen.”
Elena: I think too just knowing that somebody else has somewhat of the same vision as you and wants to do something on your own and be your own boss and start your own business. It was always in the back of my mind. It was always one of those long-term dreams. I had always dreamed to open up my own shop. I didn't study in fashion but I’ve always really loved fashion. When she approached me, I was like, “Yeah, let’s do this.” It’s just easier to say that too because you have a support system immediately. It’s scary to do something on your own, but when you have someone there with you, you have a partner. We can do this together. We can encourage each other. I was on board immediately.
Brittany: Have you always been interested in fashion and style? There are so many levels of fashion. There’s really high fashion stuff, like what you see in Vogue... I’m into personal style, like what people with limited funds do with what they have.
Kalesa: I think that why we get along and have a similar aesthetic vision is because we appreciate both ends. Like the street style idea of these are just people being creative. They’re expressing themselves. It can be weird. It can totally be off-trend. It could be on-trend, but they're putting their own twist on it, which makes it interesting. We appreciate high fashion, but part of what we’re doing specifically is we want it to be approachable and accessible to anyone. That’s where the secondhand aspect comes into play, at least partially, is that it makes it more affordable and that you can wear great, cool clothes, and fun clothes and clothes that express your personality without spending thousands of dollars on clothes. I think for me, my earliest fashion-related memory was in middle school. I had this maxi skirt -- so it was a full length skirt and it had two slits all the way up the sides -- and I took the front part -- so it was kind of like a maid’s flap -- I took the front part up and pinned it to the waist. So, it was short in the front and floor-length in the back. It was my first high-low experience. High-low came into fashion 2006, ‘7, somewhere around there. But I remember being like, “I'm doing this cool, weird thing with my skirt.” I would cut up my Barbie’s clothes. I think from like a tinkering aspect, I wanted to tinker with something and I was drawn to clothes and fabric and textiles. I was always a crafty person, so that’s where I got my start. I know you’re not a crafty person.
Elena: I am not a crafty person. I appreciate people that are. I wish I was, I admire people that can create things on their own. Back in the nineties, I was obsessed with supermodels and fashion magazines and I was so inspired. I would say my earliest fashion memory would be when I was in junior high, trying to wear my clothes in different ways. I was inspired by the magazines that I would receive. My mom was nice enough to subscribe to some of them. I have always loved fashion. I think as I’ve gotten older and become an adult, I definitely love the aspect of personal style as well. Getting inspiration from high-end, I think you get even more inspired when you see other people doing their own thing and putting their own twist on stuff.
Brittany: Can you tell us about Autumn + Bower? What will our readers see for sale in your shop?
Kalesa: Right now, it’s a summer collection. We wanted to approach the idea of selling clothes from a fashion industry standard, so their seasonality and, you know, give people a preview. We just did our lookbook. It’s kinda like a catalog, but it’s more artistic and it’s not necessarily about the individual items. It’s more to express a feeling of the brand or a feeling of how we would want the women wearing our clothes to feel. We’re trying to kind of behave like a normal fashion brand, but yet everything is secondhand. It obviously puts a lot more restraint and restrictions on how we can do that because we’re not making our clothes, we don't get to choose how many we have of each item, there’s only one of each because we’re finding them secondhand. In order to maintain seasonality and to do something like a lookbook and to have it feel like a normal fashion brand is a lot more challenging. We’re doing seasonality, but in fashion world, they are already on fall. We’ve been on fall. We wanted to be bit more realistic and I don't really agree with buying a season’s clothes three months before you can wear it. That seems impractical and it buys into that exclusivity and it’s too far on the fantasy end. We want to have the timeline similar to the fashion industry, but have it be a little more down-to-earth and be a little more realistic. Right now, there are summer clothes on our Instagram -- we actually sell through Instagram -- but we just launched e-commerce on the website. On the website, we have past seasons and they’re on sale. Spring and winter are on the website because we launched in December. That allows our customers to buy any season that we have clothes left over from. We are following the formula of putting past season items on sale in order to make room for the new stuff. Whereas other vintage-selling brands and secondhand brands are just posting or selling things that they find, we feel strongly that we really want to curate an aesthetic and a seasonality so it feels more professional and it can stand up to the fashion industry and be taken seriously, I suppose, instead of like a kitsch vintage shop.
Elena: And reflect our vision and what our aesthetic is too.
Kalesa: There are lots of brands that have aesthetics, but I think when it comes to vintage, it’s usually specific decades and we are not decadist. Of course, we have personal favorites, but we just have a bigger vision of what our aesthetic is. So, if we find something from the seventies that fits that, great. If we find something from the nineties that fits that, great. We feel strongly that vintage fashion doesn't just have to be for people who want to dress like they’re in Mad Men. It can be for anyone, it doesn't have to feel like a costume, and we’re not selling exclusively vintage. I think in the clothing world, vintage has to be twenty years old. We’re selling anything that's secondhand, but we’re drawn to vintage.
Brittany: How do you… Do you guys pick a theme at the beginning of each season? Is this summer’s different from last summer’s? Is it based on current trends or what you feel like in the moment or whatever you planned?
Kalesa: We take into consideration current trends and the mood. I do think fashion can reflect what's going on in the world and what people are feeling. The seventies has been really big the past year. I love the seventies. I'm totally excited that that’s popular. So, you’ll definitely see some of that influence in the stuff we’re selling. The same with the nineties. The nineties has come back and you’ll see some of that. How we start -- it’s not like a direct theme, like it’s going to be “Vacation in the Maldives” is our theme for the summer -- we start by creating an inspiration board. We have a Pinterest and we’ll pin images that we like and we’re vibing on for that season. We don't have the direct comparison yet because we’ve only been around since winter, so we don't have two winters or two summers to compare to yet so we’ll see how that evolves. The color palette happens organically whereas-- (Elena laughs) She’s laughing because we ended up with all this purple for the summer and neither of us wear purple. Not that the brand is exactly how we dress, but we didn't plan on purple at all because a normal fashion brand would. It’s almost like they're storyboarding, they're coming up with an inspiration, they’re pulling photos and fabric swatches and colors and feelings and whatever, and so they create something. But we’re using clothes that already exist and so we’ll start shopping and all of a sudden we’re like, “Wow, we have a bunch of Hawaiian print and purple.”
Elena: That was literally what happened.
Kalesa: We didn't plan that for summer at all. All of a sudden, that's what we’re drawn to right now. It happens organically. We look back at the photos we were pinning and we try to integrate what we thought we wanted versus what we actually picked up. We try to have the collection feel cohesive even though it’s all used. If we get some bright, true red, that’s generally not in our color palette, but we found some pieces that we really liked, so we thought we’d save them for the holiday season. For us, bright red is not something either of us would ever wear generally at all. Not that it’s a bad color, it’s just not part of... what we are envisioning for the brand. We morph a little bit with the seasonality and we’ll change our mind if we see a piece that’s just so awesome and we’ll make it work.
Brittany: Cool. I used to intern at Nasty Gal before it was really big. I asked Sophia, “Where are these clothes from?” But it’s a secret; she won't tell anyone. Do you get your clothes from all over? Do you have any secret spots? If it’s a secret, you can just say that, too.
Elena: We thrift. We like to go to secondhand stores. We’ll go to the flea market.
Kalesa: We’ll take stuff that people give us. They’ll donate stuff. Friends, family members that are editing their closet.
Kalesa: It started out with half of it was our own stuff.
Elena: Actually ninety percent of it was hers.
Kalesa: It was mostly my stuff. But when you work at a clothing brand for six years, you have way too much clothes. All of the secondhand options. Generally speaking, we’re not going to super high-end vintage boutiques because we can't turn that item. It’s not like, “We can't get a ton of money for this, so let’s not use it.” We are trying to run a business so we need to be able to mark up the item. That's just how it works. The point is we’re going to dig and hunt and do that hard work for you. Some people have the reaction, whether it’s high-end clothing or used clothing, they’re like, “I could have made that myself. I could have bought that myself and it would have been cheaper.” Well, but you didn't and that's the point. We sifted through all the stuff and picked out the goodies so you don't have to do that part. I think a lot of people like the idea of secondhand, but they find it really overwhelming. If you go into a Goodwill, Goodwills are sometimes massive. There's a lot of stuff in there, some of it better than others. A lot of people just don't like shopping in general and that’s kind of our approach. We like the hunt, we like digging. I don't necessarily want to shop at a super-curated vintage shop anyway, so we like hunting stuff down.
Elena: I remember going to thrift stores with my mom since I was in elementary school and I thought it was the coolest thing ever.
Kalesa: Yeah, yeah. My mom was a thrifter too so it must have been in our blood.
Brittany: I'm so glad it became popular. I guess I was in high school or middle school. Pieces would stand out more than at regular stores or department stores, where there's the same item in multiple sizes. At thrift stores, there’s only one and it might fit. It might not.
Kalesa: It feels more special. At least for me, I like the idea that there's a story. It was once somebody else’s and who knows who that person was and then it goes onto a new person. Sometimes we say on our Instagram, “There are still items that need a new home.” When you’re buying secondhand there's a story behind it even if you don't know what it is.
Brittany: Can you take us through a typical day at Autumn + Bower?
Kalesa: Elena and I are not necessarily the most organized people so we usually meet up -- and neither of us are morning people either -- so our start time is usually at 10am and we may or may not go across the street and get something to drink. (Laughs) Then we have a habit of going over the to-do list when we arrive, but it’s not a previously made to-do list. We make the to-do list in the moment. It usually includes planning the next post on Instagram. We have a variety of posts. We have inspirational posts, we have in-the-moment, behind-the-scenes posts, and then we have sale posts where we’re actually putting clothing items up. That requires measuring all the clothing, pricing the clothing. We don't usually photograph the clothing in the moment. We’ll have a day that we plan where we just photograph tons of clothes, it's easier that way. There’s usually an AirDrop of, “I have these photos. You have those photos.” So, we’re sending things to each other. There’s usually some Photoshop action that needs to happen ‘cause we’re doing layouts of little Instagram -- “Here’s a photo” and we’re putting text on top of it. That part is not necessarily exciting. That’s a day in the studio. If it’s a day where we’re going to go shopping, which is the more fun part, we meet up and we usually hit up three stores in one day. We usually go with the idea that we’re shopping for the current season, things that need to go up soon. But we always keep our eyes open for something in the future. We were buying fall four months ago because we found things.
Elena: I feel like... ‘cause we meet twice a week, so I guess it’s just whatever it is we need to get done for the week.
Kalesa: We’re packing and shipping. Luckily, because technology is so awesome and efficient, we only meet physically twice a week, usually, but we’re texting every single day. We started the business on Instagram so everything is off the phone. Half the time we don't even need the laptop in order to do what we’re doing. Now that we have the website up and running, it's going to require a little bit more activity on the laptop. But it’s definitely a mobile situation. We both have day jobs so we would love to both commit entirely to Autumn + Bower, but it’s just not financially feasible right now. We’re a little baby company.
Elena: We also plan our personal shopping parties. We try to have at least two a season.
Kalesa: That's a whole other ball game, but basically we’re thrifting items but it’s for particular attendees of the party. It’s kind of like a personalized pop-up. We allow five people to come at a time and we get a style profile from them and we go out and thrift for those particular clients. Then we have them all come and we drink champagne, eat cheese, and try on clothes.
Brittany: Sounds perfect. You guys mentioned that you started selling on Instagram. What are some of the advantages and challenges of selling on a social media platform?
Kalesa: I think one of the advantages is so many people are on Instagram, they’re checking it constantly, it’s instantaneous, it’s handheld, so just like accessibility. I think one of the challenges would be…
Elena: It’s kind of in the same ballpark as much as it's an advantage to be exposed to so many people, it’s been hard to create a following. Even though we’re part of Instagram and there are so many people on it, figuring out what the key is to getting more followers and more people to see our product has been quite the challenge. It’s slowly been happening.
Kalesa: Absolutely. Short of hiring someone who specifically has Instagram marketing experience -- which is a new thing to begin with, it’s not your classic marketing job, which we’re not against getting help at some point -- we’re kind of trying to see how it goes organically first. It’s more hands-on as far as we do everything. We call it an Instashop. The Instashop is via Instagram and PayPal. For someone to buy something, they have to comment on the photo of the item, and then we get notified there’s a comment. We have to go onto PayPal and invoice them. They have to see that email, pay us, and then we get notification from PayPal. Then we ship the item. There's more steps than a typical e-commerce platform where there's a third-party credit card host who's doing all of that for you, where it’s not us personally invoicing everyone by hand. Because we’re so small, buying and shipping hasn't been too laborious. It's still slow enough that we can handle it by hand. Whereas the website, we literally just launched that three days ago, we haven't experienced what that will be like, but I feel like it will be easier because it’s all happening instantaneously online without us having to take any extra steps. We’ll just pack it up and ship it at this point.
Elena: Instashops have totally exploded on Instagram. It's kind of crazy. We’ve gotten new followers from other Instashops.
Kalesa: I would say that between our followers and the people we follow, there are probably at least thirty Instagram shops, all in clothing, and that's just the ones we know about and like. It’s definitely become way more popular and so the market is more and more saturated.
Brittany: Who is your ideal customer? Do you have someone in mind that lives in the Bay Area or California? Since we don’t really have seasons here, it might be harder to find clothing you’d wear in a colder place. Or is it just anyone in the world? Is it location based?
Kalesa: I would say it’s not location-based. We definitely want to provide anyone with the opportunity. I would say it's probably like, if you want actual demographics, roughly 25 to 40. Roughly because I think that women, I'm generalizing obviously, women under 25 or under 18 are less likely to have a PayPal account or be online shopping, although I don't know the actual statistics on that. Maybe online shoppers have gradually gotten younger and younger. But I think they are less used to buying clothing for themselves so because it's secondhand and because right now we don't have a return policy, it's a risk to buy something online that you can't try on first and that’s secondhand and especially vintage. The sizes are not the same as they are now and so we measure everything. We give a more educated opinion of what the size truly is for contemporary sizing. I think just the risk factor for a younger demographic, they might be less interested in committing to that. Whereas a woman who has been shopping for herself for fifteen to twenty years knows her body type better and will be more confident in making a purchase like that. By the same token, I think that we’re still targeting people that want something unique and interesting and like the idea that it's one-of-a-kind and secondhand. Someone like my mom will thrift all the time, but I feel like there's plenty of women in the 45 to 65 who are probably not interested in doing that and want to touch and feel the clothing before they're receiving them. It’s more about someone who believes in the secondhand movement, who wants to help reduce waste in the garment industry, and who likes the idea of getting something one-of-a-kind and special, and who likes getting something in the mail that they didn't already see in person.
Elena: I think generally the people that buy from us, they love vintage. They love secondhand clothing and they appreciate it. They've probably been shopping that way for a little while now.
Kalesa: I still think we can get people on board who are not necessarily used to it. I think the price point helps. We feel strongly about keeping the price point approachable and I think that's because I don't think vintage should be exclusive. Of course, a really beautiful mint-condition forties dress, I can see why that needs to be priced higher, because it just generally is worth more.
Kalesa: We’re not trying to target collectors. We’re trying to target someone who wants clothing for their everyday life, but who thinks this is a fun way to buy secondhand clothes. The seasonality aspect, just because you mentioned that, we’re probably not selling ridiculously heavy winter down coats. I mean, we had wool coats, we had tall leather boots. We’re still trying to stick to a seasonality, but maybe shifting it a little more towards our location just because that's what we’re going to have more access to since we’re shopping here and not making it ourselves.
Brittany: How has working in Oakland influenced your work?
Kalesa: I think that's a good question especially because Anthropologie is a very clean, feminine -- there are occasionally edgy pieces that came into Anthropologie -- but since we both spent so much time there, I think that my style and what I liked when I was really in it, when I was steeped in Anthropologie, was different. Getting out of being in that store was a huge part of it. Physically actually having the studio be in Oakland, I think just getting to know other boutiques, people who are making clothing, people who are making accessories, what they're wearing and shopping and making, has definitely influenced.
Elena: I think just spending more time in Oakland too and seeing people around, like us going shopping, even if we’re grabbing a coffee somewhere at a local shop, I think that definitely helps to influence.
Kalesa: To see what people in our actual environment are wearing.
Elena: When we were in the Anthro world and that environment, we were influenced. We obviously started out at that company because we were attracted to it, but once you’re working in it, and you’re there every day, or not every day, but... You're going to be influenced.
Kalesa: You physically have to dress a certain way there. I think that we’ve both become more casual, so our personal style and aesthetic obviously bleeds into the brand.
Elena: I think for me, personally, becoming more aware about the whole garment waste industry. I work for a small boutique in Oakland and the owner only carries brands that are made in the US, specifically because she knows the people making the clothes are being paid a living wage. If they are going to source outside of the US, she makes sure that it's done ethically. Just being more aware of the whole industry, in that sense, for me personally, has been great. Knowing that we’re contributing to that movement makes it even ten times better.
Kalesa: I think that there are values of the people here that we were already leaning towards, but to be around it constantly is inspiring and makes us feel good that we’re contributing to that. I actually don't know about all the brands in Temescal Alley, but we’re in a creative area of Oakland, which is really exciting. Being in the studio, we have a painter. This girl teaches art classes to little kids. I don't know what her personal medium is, but I’ve seen her do all sorts of things over there. The studio manager does silk screen printing and you can see there's graffiti over everything purposefully. I think it's inspired even it's not directly influencing our style aesthetic. It's an appreciation of the eclecticness and the variety. I feel really grateful to be somewhere that people can pursue all of that. You saw the very interesting installation that's right there. We arranged everything and they had a performance art piece. Somebody was reading poetry. It’s really nice to be in a space where people can express themselves in so many different ways and it's all respected and appreciated by everyone else. That's really reaffirming.
Brittany: I feel like Oakland has some of the most interesting people in the Bay Area I've encountered. Just going to Art Murmur, seeing a little bit of everyone, it's so cool. I love it because the people-watching is great and everyone really dressed up in whatever their style is. You wouldn't see these people otherwise. I see the same types of people all day at work. In tech, we wear the same zip-ups. Do you have any advice for people who’d like to start their own web store?
Kalesa: We use Squarespace and it has limits, but if you don't know anything about building a website, then it's super awesome. I would say create a support system. Find the friend who knows stuff about websites, find the friend who knows any kind of business strategies, find the friend who knows about where to find, for us, maybe the people who know great estate sales in this area or something like that. It’s really… pooling your...
Kalesa: Elena and I say a lot, “It takes a village to raise a child.” Babies are on the brain. It's a very present thing in our lives right now. But it takes a village to start a business.
Kalesa: Because I don't think either of us believe in the whole the American Dream the way of “pull yourself up by your bootstraps... Work yourself to the bone,” we’re much more invested in friends and family and support. What's the saying about…? About the “sum is greater than the parts?” The idea that we can create something better as a collective.
Elena: Which I think is really true for the artists in Oakland. There's such a huge support for independent businesses, small business, artists, creative types.
Kalesa: We don't really know any of these people, but we’re following each other on Instagram and we’re tagging each other on things. Someone will come in to visit her and she’ll sell something for us. Especially as someone who doesn't have capital -- we just jumped into this with nothing -- you reach out to everyone that can help you. Be patient. That's been one of the really hard things. We see people doing similar things and we’re like, “Why aren't we as successful as them?” Knowing that it just takes hard work and time and being open to feedback. I've had friends come to me about what they're seeing in the feed, especially because fashion can be a very sensitive thing for people, being body positive, showing variety in ethnicity and body types. Neither of us are a size zero. We want to represent the real woman and that every woman is different. Getting feedback from people and learning from that has been a big thing for us. Not being afraid to ask for help.
Brittany: What can we expect to see from you in the future?
Kalesa: Ooh! Since we don't have a physical storefront and we don't necessarily plan on it -- it’s not a yes or a no on that -- we are having a pop-up shop at one of our friend’s businesses. They sell home goods and art supplies. We’re going to have a rack of clothes and accessories for people to come and shop and see stuff in person. More events like that where we just show up somewhere and have a little pop-up. More awesome, fun photo shoots so that people can see the clothing on another person and get to play in the fantasy world with us.
Elena: More services. That's definitely something we want to expand. Right now the services are obviously the shop and our personal shopping parties, but we also want to be available for one-on-one personal shopping, styling for other people’s projects, photo shoots or something like that. I think just growing in general. We’re still so new and this is just the beginning. I think we’re just open to however our business ends up growing or expands. We’re just open.
Kalesa: I think that we’ve talked about potentially altering clothes. So, taking vintage and secondhand and tweaking it. That's something that could happen in the future that gives a little more room for creativity because we can actually morph the clothes into more of a vision. I got people asking about baby stuff and we get asked about men’s. Men’s is an option that we might expand into as well.
Elena: I think because I'm pregnant people just automatically think, “You should do baby clothes, too,” and it’s like, “No, not necessarily.” I'm not going to count it out, but that's not something--
Kalesa: That’s not her priority.
Elena: Yeah, and I don't think us as partners, that's a priority either.
Kalesa: So, styling services, menswear, pop-up shops.
Elena: Pop-up shops. We definitely want to get out there.
Kalesa: Show people the goods. That's what we think is great about having this space and other creative types we know are doing similar things because we can collaborate. Our friend’s store is called Long Weekend and I just think it's so great we can go and sell clothes and they're giving us a place to do that. Ideally we’re bringing a customer base in and then we’re getting some of their customer base. It’s helping each other out, just spreading the word of both brands. People that are into our clothes will more likely be into stuff they're selling and vice versa.
Elena: Ironically enough, they're women entrepreneurs.
Kalesa: We’re all about women helping women, instead of women competing with women. We’re all in this together.
Elena: It's all about a support group.
Photos of their studio taken by myself.
Special thanks to Kalesa and Elena for discussing Autumn + Bower with us. You can follow Autumn + Bower on their website, Instagram, and Facebook.
