How to create a designer collection.

I show you here. As it regards to Tibi Fall 25.

First: Get inspired

It comes in waves, it shows up in the strangest places, sometimes it has to be extracted and other times it’s coming at you so hard you’ve got to try and put your arms around it to figure out what it all means. That can often feel like nailing jell-o to a wall, until it doesn’t. Often just getting outside of our day to day does this trick, so we headed to Europe to explore and create, the only criteria being: a place we’d never been before but that’s always intrigued. Traci and I set out to Berlin and Antwerp in search of……something.

An itch to be scratched, of sorts. And while Berlin confirmed a grit we were hungering for, Belgium is where it all came together. A few hours into our visit, Traci and I were hooked. The ease of which Antwerp presents itself: prideful of the past, embracing of the future and with no demarcation between the two -they’re woven together seamlessly- felt so very right. It is the city that just simply “is.”

A town square, case in point here: While someone may see a poignant sculpture of a boy sleeping with his dog, Nello & Patrasche, we saw the embodiment of an embrace of past and present. The cobblestone literally climbing over and part of a sculpture that left no confusion to its recentness.

In this place we got in the zone, the flow, that creative state you hope happens each time you embark on a new collection. Defiantly independent, strong, and settled. That’s how Traci and I felt at the onset of designing the Fall 25 collection that’s only just arrived, a full year after we set pen to paper. Or touched down in Antwerp as it were. A place steeped but not mired in heritage, small enough to get your arms around but not so small as to feel stifling or parochial. I know why big cities try and recreate intimacy, authenticity and luxury: it’s because they, and much of the world, can sometimes feel anything but. And hardly all three at once. But Antwerp encapsulated this trinity; nothing tried to be, no facades. One can walk the entire city in a day, but do it again the next day and see it through a fully different lens. Like a freshwater pearl, tiny, rich and without uniformity. There was no recreation of environments to make a mood, they just were…..moody. We fell in love with the craftsmanship resulting from a half century of attention and getting on with the business of life, pragmatism and creativity weighs gently on the city.

Second: Build a visual board of how you are feeling.

This step varies. Some seasons it’s a jumble of words, artwork or photos. Since we were there living the moment together, we simply started sketching the mood……

How do we mix the craving for femininity with the grit that’s so prevalent in this city? Maybe it’s a skirt that softly drapes like ruffles but is actually strips of fabric? Maybe the fabric is a sporty nylon, most definitely not silk. And we sketch more, how do we wear this skirt in real life, so it feels part of our day and not forced? Can it work with blazers, big sweaters sand moto inspired jackets?

A bit of toughness can come from Moto details, but how can we make it not so obvious? No tropes here. What if we took details from a vintage pair of motocross pants, but interpreted them through a super refined tailored wool trouser? We love the seamless juxtaposition of modernity and heritage; so rough sport with a polished pant….it’s coming together.

Third: Start the hardmarking: confirm ideas, make decisions.

Back home in NYC, we land with notebooks filled with ideas and Traci after an 10 hour plane ride has already progressed to detailed sketches to share with the patternmakers back in our studio. Allana and Shruti are scheduling meetings with our European fabric suppliers, the perfect tweed from Sordevolo, robust tailoring from are what they think matches what we’ve told them we crave. They’re not wrong. Traci takes our more emotional sketches from the trip and she starts to refine them, create “flats” that can be accurately interpreted by our patternmakers. She begins draping items and showing me her creations, asking if this nails what we were feeling. And over the course of the next couple of months, we meet in my office, and I try on the latest prototype she’s just pulled off the machine. Sometimes our tech designer is summoned to make changes, our patternmaker steps out to understand better the curve adjustment. I take photos and I build a board, think about the shoes I want to wear, where we want to double down and where we want to pull back.

We finalize, build boards of the styles, look for repetition, make sure our eye is excited, and then take a very pragmatic lens to ensure we can wear the pieces: with the past, with what we’re offering now, and with a long lens to what we’ll want in the future.

Fourth: Commit to developing the pieces.

We confirm the styles, the textiles, order the fabrication for the samples and put a request in to the sample room to start building the samples that will land on the runway.

Fifth: Try on again, wear, walk, talk, react.

Runway prep: try everything on, style it out, and make tough decisions - is it working? Do we love it as much as we thought we would?? Sometimes I walk around the office to see who will look up from their desk and react. And who just asks me to go get them some coffee.

[FROM LEFT TO RIGHT] Compact Eco Poplin Balloon Dress, Perfect Unisex Long Sleeve T-Shirt “Untitled”, Serviette Baby T-Shirt, Compact Ultra Stretch Knit Sculpted Meir Pant, Recycled Tropical Wool Sculpted Meir Trouser, Lotte Nylon Shirred Neck Top, Compact Ultra Stretch Knit Sculpted Meir Trouser Skirt, Boiled Wool Crewneck Easy Pullover, Italian Sporty Nylon Ribbon Skirt, Jules Wool Gingham Long Belted Bomber, Jules Wool Gingham Sculpted Silke Skirt

Sarah dives in to the samples first alone, and then with me, trying everything on, photoing, building a visual narrative. As our brand director and stylist, of course she takes peeks early on- in a big loft space it’s hard not too, and by this stage she’s been briefed on the collection’s direction, but we take pains to make sure she’s not in the weeds. By this time, Traci and I have lived with the collection in our heads and on paper for over six months and it gets hard to step out of your own way. This is where the rubber meets the road, when we explain to Sarah the vision, does it connect with the clothing that she’s seeing? Or are we in a pipe dream? Sometimes it’s a little of both, and that’s why Sarah’s job is so important, to make sure that the designs come together in a way that speaks to the message, she takes it one step further to fully communicate our intent to editors, buyers and then the people that share our mindset. The other creative pragmatists out there.

Sixth: Showtime.

And the final output is here. But lest you think we’re done, this is just the beginning for the rest of the office. We’re off to Paris Fashion Week, we’re meeting with the buyers, we are working frantically to fit, produce, ship. And then we get it in the stores, we do our style classes, we try and convey the story.

And did I mention that while all this is happening, we’re simultaneously desigining and showing Resort 26, and creating the beginings of Spring 26????

But it’s all good.

We love what we do, nearly every day. But not all - because that would just not be totally truthful. And that’s fine, because that is life. And life is good that way.

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