With so many basics lines in the market today, it's hard to imagine that another one needs to be added to the mix. But as far as Rumi Neely, the veteran blogger behind Fashiontoast, is concerned, there simply aren't enough elevated, really thoughtfully done basics that don't run the Row-like prices. That's exactly why she created her two-year old collection, Are You Am I. Show
Now, Are You Am I is on every Hadid, Jenner, and wanna be Hadid/Jenner worth her salt. The possible secret to Neely's success? "Every piece is the end-all-be-all of that exact category of the thing that it is," Neely notes. "It's like everything—the silk, the leather, the softer fabrics, the T-shirts—are just like the ultimate of what they are." And prices, while far from cheap, still hover within the not too-too crazy level for really good quality ($379 for a silk dress, $499 for a lambskin mini skirt). Read on for more from the blogger-turned model-turned mogul on why she thinks Hollywood has flocked to her designs, what it's like to design when you're your own muse, and what's next for the company. Have you always wanted to be a designer?In the beginning I just was dreaming about working in fashion at all, no matter what the role would be, and it just seemed so unlikely. I was living in San Diego and it seemed so far away. I started my blog—never thought that would have an audience, and that turned into such a huge, life-changing career for me. I definitely wanted it, I just didn't fully plan on it, of course. Everything kind of was leading towards that and I had so many specific ideas always about how exactly I wanted something to look. I would customize so many things in my wardrobe that were vintage or things that I was buying, and it just really all aligned and the timing was perfect.  Splash News Hailey Baldwin in the Are You Am I Zillah Cami. Who you have in mind when you're designing Are You Am I?It sounds insane, I know, but I think that—I'm so lucky because I basically am my own muse. [laughs] I can get into my own head [and] not have to really envision that girl. I am that girl and I know what I want something to feel like and move like. It's really inspiring, of course, to see so many girls wearing the line and I love their take on it, it almost feels like this religion or something at this point. It's really exciting. I definitely think about the types of girls that I think would like a certain thing, but at the end of the day it's the most pure expression of myself, let's say, what I'm doing and what I want to create. What is your process like when you are working on the collection?It's really cool because it's all exactly my vision. I'm not watering anything down. I think that our strength is actually how niche our product is, and not that it's very commercial and very similar to things that are out there already. I have ideas on how I want everything to look—from an oversized clutch to a long maxi silk dress, and the process of that is basically just envisioning that thing, envisioning the moment that I would be wearing that piece—like what time of day, how do I want to feel, what mood am I in—and just going off of that and then explaining all of that and sketching it out with my pattern-maker, who just understands me. The way that we work together is really great. He gets me and the whole process I feel like is probably not very traditional, because I don't have that fashion school background whatsoever. I explain everything to him and how I want the finishings to be. Then everything is produced in downtown LA. Has there ever been a time throughout this process where you've wavered on what you've designed?I think that for the position that I'm in the strongest thing that I can do is produce pieces that are exactly the thing that I want them to be. Every piece is the end-all-be-all of that exact category of the thing that it is. It's like everything, the silk, the leather, the softer fabrics, the t-shirts are just like the ultimate of what they are. Any type of commercialization or, like I said, watering that idea down would be so damaging and frankly, be pretty uninspiring to me, because the fact that every piece is like my dream thing that I just can't get enough of and am just so excited to wear, is just the whole point of it. I've been so lucky that there's been such an intense and positive response to the line. It's one of the craziest things. Everyone talks about the finishings on the pieces. Are you surprised by that?I'm not surprised. When someone touches them and actually sees the attention to detail—I'm such a maniac about just having every last possible bit feel just as if so much care was put into it, and it was. It's almost like a really selfish experience to wear one of our slip dresses or one of our blouses because it's so luxurious in a secret way. Why do you think celebrities like Kendall Jenner, Stella Maxwell, and Bella Hadid love the line?It's just really casual but in a very purposeful [way]; streamlined when it wants to be streamlined, and undone when it wants to be undone. I feel like it's really easy to wear a billion ways. If I was one of those girls and I was being paparazzi-snapped at all random hours of the day, I feel like this is kind of a really easy, fun option to look cute. They just wear it so well and I feel like they kind of get what I'm doing and why I'm doing it, and it's really cool to see that. The tagline on the Are You Am I site is, "For girls that get it." What do you mean by that?Girls who care about that attention to detail. Girls who want to look cool all the time that they can, but not put too much effort into it. She's the girl who wants to be able to throw eight things into a suitcase and just be ready. The girl who wants to wear every category of our pieces is the girl that gets it. Splash News Kendall Jenner in the Are You Am I Nyx satin bra. You started designing almost two years ago, in December 2014. Where do you hope to see the brand going?The options for what we can do is becoming so much more expansive, and that's really exciting to me. I feel like doing basic, casual pieces and then doing really elevated, more unexpected things is becoming more possible. I feel like I do eventually want to be able to address more categories, like active or evening. We just launched swim which is such a fun thing that I always wanted to do. Living in LA, it's just part of what you need every week. It's a small, very powerful collection which I feel was an obvious step for us. Do you think you'd ever want to get into bags and shoes?Definitely. Some of that is already in different stages of development. But yeah, I think that those are all in the works eventually. That'll be exciting. Will you keep doing chokers even when they're not super trendy?Personally, I've always been into chokers. They're definitely having a big moment right now, and that's so cool. I feel like they're borderline here permanently at this point. They're just such an easy way to make something simple so much better. So I'm obsessed, for sure. We have some really great new types of accessories that we're launching soon that I can't say much more about right now. But definitely just expanding on the accessory collection, and keeping on growing with different styles of necklaces and more. So not just chokers. |
