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Kickin' It to the Curb and Culture Clash
January 17, 2010 Cheryl McMullen

Kickin' It to the Curb and Culture Clash

A lot of research and effort goes into a collection before you ever commit pencil to paper.
  • Researching trends, colors, and culture.
  • Studying and analyzing runway creations from New York, London, Paris, and Milan.
  • Looking at what is going on in popular culture.
And after you have all that in your head,
you sometimes have to kick it all to the curb and go with your gut.

And that is exactly what I did. Our Spring 2010 collection (our 20th btw since we are celebrating our 20th anniversary this year) didn't evolve from the traditional research means, but from researching museum archives.  When I came across this vivid jhuladi all my previous research scattered to the curb and instead spun off of this one boy's jacket from India. . .

So this is how my thought process evolved:

  • Indian jhuladi, and shisha mirror work
  • Japanese kimonos with sherry blossom motifs
  • Chinese opera costumes with dragon embroidery
  • Romanian vests with eastern European embroidery
  • Balkan skirts in girlie silhouettes and novelty embellishment
  • And of course my beloved cowboys and Indians of the American West
From here you may jump to Double D Ranch™s  website to see how all of this came together in what I call Culture Clash and/or you can follow along with me here on Double Talk to get the behind the scenes insights of wonderful details, symbolism, and vintage inspirations. I hope you will love Culture Clash as much as I do.  It's all about color and cultures harmoniously clashing together.

- Cheryl

PS: special thanks to my cast of characters who inspired me all along the way.

 

Filed in: American West, Chinese opera costumes, cowboys, east Indian embroidery, Fashion, India, Indians, Inspiration, Japanese kimonos, jhuladi, Romanian vest, shisha mirror embroidery, symbolism, vintage, vintage child's jacket, website
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Comments

Emily Inthachak - May 16, 2016

You should do a tee of this. Gorgeous! Can’t wait to get my hands on some spring stuff. We’ve just come out of the deepest freeze we’ve had in south Ga. in years.

Paul Armstrong - May 16, 2016

Cheryl, this is great. Thanks for sharing.

Rose - May 16, 2016

Love the burst of color especially after all of the cold and snow! It warms my heart and makes me think of beautiful spring yet to come! I will definitely be purchasing this Tee amongst others! Looking forward to the arrival of this fabulous line!

Cheryl - May 16, 2016

Chris – yes Pioneer Woman is hysterical. Mom got me her cookbook for Christmas – I haven’t tried any recipes, but maybe when things slow down a bit. Thanks always for your comments on the blog. They are much welcomed and appreciated. The blog is my way of getting all of the wonderful inspiration and details out. Before this I was so frustrated because I had all these ideas and really no way to share them. Blogging has become a terrific medium for me to be able to share and get direct feedback. Love ya and stay tuned!

Chris Barton - May 16, 2016

Cheryl – I think it is fascinating to hear how you get your design ideas and I love the unexpected mix of colorful prints with denim and leather, etc. for Spring. It means there are no rules anymore!!! It always got my juices flowing to merchandise my store – pulling out garments, jewelry, accessories, home decor, etc to create vignettes that would hopefully inspire customers……
On another note, thanks for making note of the Pioneer Woman blog – it’s a hoot!!

Cheryl - May 16, 2016

Thanks, Paul – and thanks for doing the touch-up test for us. I look forward to working together in the future!

Cheryl - May 16, 2016

Emily, Thank you, thank you, thank you – you made my day! It is finally warming up here in Yoakum too. We have had unusually cold weather. My stock tank froze over and that is unusual!
On “You should do a tee of this” – I did. It’s called We are the World Tee. I’ll showcase it for you here on the blog. Thanks for reading and commenting
Cheryl

Jayne - May 16, 2016

Stellar work there evyoerne. I’ll keep on reading.

georgia - May 16, 2016

SUPER COOL!!!!!perfect mix of different traditional elements in a modern interpretation…definetely my style))

Cheryl - May 16, 2016

Rose, thanks. I really think you will love it. We have gotten a huge response thus far and stores are selling it right out of the box. Just fyi, we have a great turquoise color in the collection that I think would be perfect for you. It’s called “toledo turquoise” and you might like it in the the tee you mentioned. Glad to hear from you, – missed you! Cheryl

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