Justify Your Designs: Sally Wu

New designers display their favorite piece, and explain why you need it in your closet. Today, we’re checking in with Sally Wu of Act 1 who is showing a blouse from her first collection. You can learn more about her here: www.act1nyc.com.

Explain to me why I need this item in my closet.

My design is ageless. It’s not specifically designed for an age group. It’s about the clothes for a confident women who knows who she is. She is sophisticated, well informed just about everything and she is never showy. The blouse showing here is an item that you can wear for day to night. It’s office-appropriate and it’s also fun with interesting yet subtle details. From one look, it’s just another silk blouse, but when you look again, the armhole is dropped. There’s gathering details at sleeves. The collar is double layered with stitch and gathered details, it frames the face and draws attention to the wear’s face. It’s made of silk. So it’s soft, and comfortable to wear. You can move, run around all day work, play. You don’t have to feel restricted or uncomfortable in your clothes to look good.

It looks a lot like another blouse which I already have. Why is yours so much better?

Just as I said, on the 1^st look, it’s just a blouse. However, it takes a 2^nd and 3^rd look to see the details. I like clothes like that. It takes time and thinking to create it and it takes the same to understand. The more you look at it, the more details you can find. Fashion shouldn’t just be the surface. It should have some thought process put into it. What you wear speaks for who you are without a word. The woman wears my clothes appreciate the details and discreet luxury that is put into it.

Perhaps you are a charlatan. What are your background and qualifications?

Perhaps I am. LOL. I was a calligrapher by training. I went into fashion only because I was fascinated by it. Fashion does influence so much every day life. A head scarf can be a religious debate for thousands. What the 1^st lady wears can influence the whole country’s opinion on the president…people spends hours and hours to dress themselves.

Oscar Wilde said “Illusion is the first of all pleasures”. Fashion is all about creating illusions. It’s a form of pleasure. I am as qualified as anyone else and as NOT qualified as anyone else. The truth is that, I got so fascinated with fashion; I spend over 15 years working in the industry and learned all the tedious little details on how to turn and idea into a sketch, then turn the sketch into a real piece of well functioning garment that makes sense in a whole collection.

Will it look as good if I’m a size 14 as it will if I’m a size 2? Be honest.
The truth is that women who take good care of their bodies usually look better than the woman who let themselves go.  Some women are naturally bigger, some are naturally smaller. Most women are never happy with their sizes or weight. However, when I look at a woman, I see if she is taking good care of her body, her spirit. If something is not well (it doesn’t matter if it’s the  mind or the body), it usually shows. Make-up cannot cover it, clothes cannot cover it.  In most of the cases, women who maintain their body size take good care of themselves. In a general statement, being less than size 14 is healthier, thus clothes look better.

Will I have to live off Ramen noodles for a month to afford it?

The answer is NOT AT ALL! The blouse is merely $250 retail. Fancy ramen noodle can be costly nowadays too. My Momofuku bill for 4 adds up to that just in 1 meal.

Will my relatives in rural Iowa think I’m a freak if I show up to our family reunion in this?:

Not at all. There’s no shock value in my clothes at all. You are not dressed like a 1980s Madonna to shock your relatives for the sake of rebellion. You are way over that! You wear your clothes to be you. It’s all very personal, very subtle. Your relatives from rural Iowa will look at it once and think it’s a normal blouse.  Only people who look at it again will discover some new details, then they will look again, find something different again…this is the fun part.