As founder of Fashivly, a fashion-tech startup that "curates the internet," Ashlyn puts together fully-fledged looks for Fashivly's clients, expertly styling for their unique needs. Check out her favorites below.
Ashlyn's wearing: RACHEL COMEY New Aires Top in Black; BITE STUDIOS Pleat Shorts in Black; TOTEME The Wedge Heel Pump in Cream; DRIES VAN NOTEN Capacious Hand Bag in Black
Q: Tell us about your experience in the fashion industry.
A: I’ve spent about 10 years in the fashion industry. I've kind of always worked in the department store space: I interned for Saks and Neimans, I did my graduate program at SCAD in luxury fashion management & marketing, then I worked for Belk Corporate for five years. I did everything from creative branding and marketing to creative production and then ended up leading the styling team there. I oversaw all of our in-house stylists, E-comm, and then freelance: any look that was styled for the company Instagram, TV, commercials. Everything kind of came through my department.
Q: You live in Charlotte now. Has that impacted your style? Where does your style come from?
A: My style definitely does not fit the Charlotte scene. I feel like I'm like most of the time in black; let me go into a little bit of my personal style background. I was always super preppy, I grew up in the South, so there was always a ton of color. Then my style kind of started to evolve probably in my early twenties. I was always really drawn to this edgier kind of grungy pop, punk, emo kind of style. My husband was in one of those bands growing up. I always saw those girls and I was like, “They look so cool, I want to dress like that.” I started experimenting a little bit more and now I feel like I'm kind of a mix. One of my style influences is Sandy in Grease, but more specifically, her style transformation. She was like this really prim, preppy girl and then she had that transition at the end where she's still got elements of that. She's got the red lips, but she's in all black, she's got the cool hair.
Ashlyn's wearing: ROSETTA GETTY Peak Lapel Houndstooth Jacket in Multi, Pull On Houndstooth Cropped Flare Pant in Multi; DRIES VAN NOTEN Sling Back Pump in Lilac; JW ANDERSON Corner Bag in Mint
Q: In three words, how would you describe your style?
A: Three words is so tough. I feel like polished is one. Fashivly, the company I founded, is a fashion tech start up. As CEO and founder, a lot of times I'm reaching for a blazer or a suit. That's definitely an element of my style. I would say edge or grunge is always something I’ve been drawn to as well. So with that polished piece, I always like to have something like a boot, or a lug sole Oxford, or something that's just a little bit off from kind of that polished version. And for number three, I mean, I hate to say black is a style thing, but that's when I feel my best—when I'm in an all black look.
Q: Talk to us about Fashivly. How did it come to be?
A: Fashivly is an online personal styling platform and we are basically curating the internet. There's over a billion apparel options online and we basically use our industry experience & stylists to find and put together head to toe, accessorized looks for you and we use the whole internet to choose products from. We have you fill out a pretty detailed questionnaire, tell us everything from where you live, what you do, your lifestyle, send over style inspiration, and then we put together head to toe accessorized looks, either 5 or 10 looks. We show you how everything fits together, how everything goes together.
Fashivly actually had a little bit different trajectory than most companies. So I quit my job in 2020. I knew I wanted to start a company and didn't really know what that was yet. And then a friend reached out to me in September of 2020. She was telling me, girl, I've been wearing sweatpants for six months. I feel like I'm like losing myself. I'm not getting dressed every day and I feel like I can't figure out what I need to wear right now. So basically what I did for her is instead of doing like a typical in person session, like I would normally do, going and doing pulls in person, because of COVID, I was like, how can I do this virtually? I took a version of the deck that I used to present to buyers, executives, brands before we would have a photo shoot that had the fully styled look, the styling notes for the stylist on set, and I basically just tailored that for her. And so a by-product of that was it was super shareable on social media, unlike a personal styling session would have been. She shared that on Instagram stories and I think I had six or seven people reach out from there. And that's really kind of been the story of our company for the last 3.5 years. We had been bootstrapped up until a couple weeks ago, and we’re getting into the funding space now. But yeah, it's been very organic, very word of mouth; social media has been huge for us.
Ashlyn's wearing: TANYA TAYLOR Reinata Dress in Medium Indigo Blue; ALEXANDRE BIRMAN Evelyn Tall Combat Boot in Black
Q: What's one thing you wish more people knew about fashion?
A: The one thing for us at Fashivly that we talk about all the time is that clothes are such a hack to like, find your self confidence. I think a lot of times people that aren’t into fashion or aren't into clothes or shopping or whatever, they're like, oh, that's not for me. But I think one of the things that we really are about as a company is that fashion is for everyone and it's one of the only things that unites everybody. Like we all get dressed every day, right? And it really is a way to kind of unlock like your coolest, most elevated, most confident self, just by putting on an outfit that you feel really great in. And so we're kind of like your best friend that's coming along and helping you figure out what are those pieces that make you feel really good? What are the things that make you feel really confident? And then that kind of unlocks this new version of yourself that you can go out and kind of do the things that you dream of just because of how you feel inwardly.
Q: Do you have any go-to pieces in your wardrobe?
A: It's a blazer. Even in the summer, styling it with denim shorts or, most of the time I'll be more casual and I'll have a blazer at the office and put that on for meetings, then take it off. I would say that's number one and then number two for me is any lug sole shoe: a boot, an Oxford, even a sandal. That's kind of my go to, as I always like a little bit of height and platform because I'm 5 ft 1. So, I always like to make myself appear a little bit taller than I actually am.
Q: How does being petite impact your style?
A: That's a great, great question. I think one of the things that we hate is when people say, “Oh, if you're petite, you can't wear this. If you are this type of body, you can't wear this.” We are firm believers that you can wear anything you want: you just have to tweak it a little bit. For me, one of the things that makes me feel really confident and powerful is wearing really oversized clothes. A lot of the designers that I lean towards, a lot of the silhouettes I love, are oversized. A lot of times that means tailoring and making it fit specifically for me. And then it's all about balance and the proportion of a silhouette. So if I'm wearing a really, really wide leg, oversized pair of pants, pairing that with something a little bit more slim. There's a lot of other little hacks, like always rolling up my sleeves. I think maybe some people are aware of this, as I think there's been a couple of TikTok videos that have gone viral. But if you're petite, having your wrist show is a huge thing. So you can wear really voluminous things, lots of layers, lots of volume: if you just push the sleeves up and have your wrists show it balances out visually. Same thing with your ankles and neck. If you've got something that's really chunky around your neck, making sure you're showing your ankle and wrist balances it out. Those are the kind of things that I live by. Other than that, I love just proportion, volume, and just balancing those out.