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On a sunny fall day inside the Elizabeth Suzann studio, designer Elizabeth Pape is surrounded by three production specialists, reams of fabric, and amber-scented candles that her mother made by hand. A garage door is open, flooding the space with sunlight and giving Pape's two dachshunds a bright, warm perch.
The Berry Hill location is a fine upgrade from the tiny space she used to occupy in the back of a gym in midtown. Inside, her husband and business partner, Chris, who joined the operation full-time six months ago, is taking a callthough he's still finishing up his law degree at Vanderbilt, he's now officially running Pape's business, too. Chris and Elizabeth are just part of the dream team getting Elizabeth Suzann off the ground. Also in the mix are Elise Joseph, a social media influencer who formerly worked with Imogene + Willie, and Barry Wishnow, an industry veteran who has run companies from Calvin Klein to Hugo Boss America; both are consulting to help the designer see and attain bigger goals for her business.
Pape, who founded the company two years ago, is a self-taught designer who didn't start sewing until she went to college (where she studied art history). 'I made clothes for myself and sold skirts repurposed from pillowcases to a small boutique,” she says. After delaying grad school several times, she realized that what she truly wanted to do was make clothes. It wasn't long before she was selling out at trunk showsand then she met Joseph, who gave her enough confidence to see that she was doing the right thing.
'It was her stamp of approval that made me feel like I was on to something,” says Pape. 'Once I accepted that, the brand began to grow past the first stage.”
Her debut collection showed this past spring at Nashville Fashion Week, and in the fall, she released a collection that draws inspiration from across the decades: cocoon silhouettes from the '20s,'90s minimalism in the form of cropped shirts and funnel necks, and the bell sleeves of the '70s. Many of these silhouettes will repeat themselves in her collections, while the cuts and fabrics will reflect the seasons. In her latest winter collection, she shows off velvet shifts and her first leather jacket.
'I love velvet for the holidays,” Pape says. 'It's luxe without the glitter and glitz.” A leather wrap belt is also among the collectionanother first for the designer and something she wants to expand upon. 'I try to keep the designs as simple as possible, but if I experiment with color or pattern, I'll do it through accessories,” she explains.
As she grows, her most important goal is to keep production in-house. 'Outsourcing can become appealing as you grow and it becomes difficult to keep up with the demand,” she says. '[But] having a large facility with the right people and equipment, doing all our own production the right way, is the primary goal and what's most exciting to me.” Available by appointment or online at elizabethsuzann.com