Having You In Stitches

Any girl or boy who has an offbeat sense of style understands how frustrating commercial clothing stores can be. Many of them tend to be full of cheap fabrics, copycat designs and strange cuts, usually for the price of a small skyscraper. You can spend an entire day in one clothing store, trying on every item on the racks, emerging only with a t-shirt that you’ll probably end up cutting the sleeves off of, anyways. So what’s a fashion-conscious, creatively inspired dresser to do?

Amy Carlsen of Sasha Clothing Co. took to the bargain bins and learned the ways of the sewing machine. Now, instead of spending hours and hours deciding what to wear, she simply whips up a few cute shirts if her closet is looking sparse. And, much to the pleasure of many a disgruntled clothing buyer, she makes that service available to the public. By creating pieces chock full of character and originality, she bridges that oh-so-wide gap between The Limited and the thrift stores, allowing her customers to finally buy clothing that they are truly excited about without totally breaking the bank or having to scour every vintage store within a 25 mile radius. And she’s recently extended her services to bands, creating all sorts of 80’s inspired goodies to spice up the life of any merch table. So put down the scissors, fashionistas, and stop freaking out if you just can’t find the time to learn how to sew. Sasha Clothing Co. is here to save the day.

Interview conducted by Mollie Wells. Pictures provided by Amy Carlsen.

Name: Amy Carlsen
Company: Sasha Clothing Company

Bettawreckonize: How and when did Sasha start?

Amy Carlsen: I’ve officially had the name for about a year and a half now, but it never went full speed up until a few months ago. My friend asked me to figure out how to make vegan purses for his shoe store, and that’s how I started making handbags. We were already making hand-screened shirts for the Blood Brothers, and it all just kind of snowballed from there. Like, “Hey, where did you get that shirt?” or “Hey, I love your purse.” Then the light went off in my head: “You like? I can make one for you!”

BW: You work with your friend Aska, right? How did you guys start working together?

AC: Aska is about to have her baby, so she hasn’t been allowed to sew for a few months now. Doctor’s orders. She and I met through Nathan, her husband. They live upstairs! Once her baby comes, I hope she still sews with us. My friend Laura works with me now. She recently got fired from her job, so we took that as kind of a blessing in disguise. I needed help, and she wanted to sew!

BW: Do you each have specific tasks, or do you work on the same things?

AC: We can all do everything. What I love is that all three of us bring something different to the table. We all love what we do, most importantly, but we have a bit of different taste. There’s a lot of “Oh my gosh, that is soooo cute.” What girls. I always get stuck screening things though, that’s the one thing no one else can do.

BW: Have you always wanted to be involved in the fashion industry somehow? Do you have any educational background in fashion?

AC: Growing up in the Midwest, I always wanted to be different than everyone else. I was always very into cutting my own hair, cutting off sleeves, that sort of thing. But I never knew how to sew. No one in my immediate family did, so I never learned. I ended up going to school for photography and graphic design. I had no idea how much I loved making clothes. It’s not like you can take a fashion class in high school, you know? Well, at least not that many years ago and in Ohio.

I moved out to Seattle after getting my BFA and started the endless search for a job I actually enjoyed. No such luck. Every design job was some crap about designing an eagle with an American flag. Barf. It was almost like you had no creative say, and that just did not work for me. Office jobs were a nightmare, I seriously can’t imagine ever working one again. Those were some really rough years for me, but it brought me to creating Sasha! I decided, against everyone’s better judgment, to just do what makes me happy. So I got a job as a nanny and [my boyfriend] bought me a sewing machine!

BW: Did Sasha kind of start out of a dissatisfaction with the clothing you’d find in stores?

AC: For sure! I was short and little, but things never fit right. That’s one thing I worry about so much when I make clothes now; that whomever is ordering things is satisfied with the fit!

BW: How do you go about sizing? Do you do custom pieces for each individual, or do you have a specified line that you sell?

AC: If someone is ordering quite a few pieces, I get their measurements and go from there. The clothes we make for a shop, though, we try to go off sizing that we ripped off of a t-shirt company.

BW: Do you find that most of your customers are satisfied with the fit? I know some people worry that designer clothing will always run small.

AC: We haven’t had a complaint yet.

BW: How did you go about promoting Sasha? I’d imagine that spreading the word about a clothing company may be a little harder than with a band or something of that sort. Was your initial promotion mostly word of mouth, or did you guys advertise at all?

AC: It’s been insane! I just thank God everyday for the responses we get. I initially had the website created for the sake of an interview on lightupthesky.com. That was done on April 1st this year. The interview didn’t go up until a while later, but everyone started emailing the link to another five people, then another five. It was crazy! The store isn’t even up yet, and we feel that we are in over our heads. It’s great, though, no complaints. Once we feel that we can handle the capacity, we’ll advertise. But the website gets quite a lot of hits everyday. Making merch for bands has been great advertisement as well.

*Interviewer’s Note: As of publication, the online store is available.

BW: Which bands have you worked with?

AC: We’re currently making handbags for Pretty Girls Make Graves. We’ve done bracelets, handbags and shirts for the Blood Brothers. Bracelets and handbags for the Cinema Eye. Purses for Rosie Thomas. Damien Jurado wants some shirts and wristbands. Wristbands for the label Sound Virus. Dillinger Escape Plan handbags. Lujos Records handbags and wristbands. Dead in Hollywood shirts and handbags. That might be it. I hope I’m not forgetting a million things.

BW: Did you always intend to do band merch when you started Sasha, or did it just sort of end up that way?

AC: It just kind of happened. I love it though, because I always knew that there was a reason for my passion for music. I used to book shows years ago in Ohio, but that just didn’t seem like the reason.

BW: Where do you get your design inspiration? Who do look up to in that respect?

AC: I feel like in college when they would ask me the meaning of some sculpture or photograph, and I’d just make up some B.S. The truth is, I like what I like. There isn’t one designer that I adore or one clothing line. Don’t get me wrong, there’s some great stuff out there! I just take a little piece of everything that I see, and try to combine it into something new and fun. After I get done sewing something, and I try it on, I get so excited and want to show everyone I know. I want the people who wear our clothes to be really excited about what they put on their bodies.

BW: Your pieces (the bracelets in particular) have some of the craziest, funnest fabric I’ve ever seen. Where do you find all that stuff?

AC: I think growing up in the 80’s, you just can’t compete with those times. All those great neons. There’s just a place in my heart for all of those colors. We get the fabrics at local fabric stores around here. It works out nicely thanks to the old ladies that hate me! They always try to cut in front of me in line. It’s okay, though, because they don’t pick the fabrics with the cool textures. I mean, what kind of granny wears yellow mesh? We also try to order stuff online at bargain shops. We try to do everything out of bargain bins!

BW: Do you tend to gear the bracelets mostly towards girls, or are they usually more unisex?

AC: We try to do unisex, or at least a fair amount of half girl, half boy. It’s hard to make boy stuff, because it is so much more limited. We love making huge flowers and what not, but poor boys just wont wear that! Maybe I should put on the tags “Looks Hot On Boys.”

BW: Do you usually know what the bracelets are going to look like before you make them, or do you play it by ear?

AC: We completely play it by ear. There are scraps laying around everywhere. We just start on one, pick up this fabric and that, switch the stitch, and let loose! We try to make a rule that we have to use all the fabric we have before we can buy anymore. Ha. Yeah, right.

BW: Is Sasha like a full-time job for you?

AC: For me, personally, I was nannying full-time and doing Sasha full-time, but I recently quit one of the jobs. I now work two days a week nannying for a family that I’ve worked with for a year and a half. I adore them! I would work for them even if I could
do Sasha full time, financially.

BW: Do you have an interest in turning Sasha into a huge design company, or do you prefer to keep it on a smaller, more independent scale?

AC: We all want to make this into our full time income. I would love to someday be able to just come up with ideas, designs, figure it out on the sewing machine and then have someone else mass produce it. However, I would never, ever, ever want someone to not have a creative input. I would love to keep every item at least a little bit different. We are currently trying to stock up for our online store, and it's a whole other world. I enjoy making every bracelet different, but I also enjoy knowing what I’m going to be using (thread color, fabrics, stitch, etc) for 10 bracelets in a row.

Sasha Clothing Co.’s store can be accessed online at http://www.sashaclothingco.com