When my daughters began dedicating their time and energy to sports, I started to notice how few options there were available on the market for athletic apparel that fit well and that they felt good wearing. Since I’ve spent my career working in the fashion industry, I understood why. In many cases, major brands are slow to move because the money is in boys activewear. Girls starting to dominate sports is becoming more common, and the fashion and clothing have been slow to catch up to it.
Based on my daughter’s input, I started seeing an opportunity to dress athletic girls who still wanted to look feminine. So my daughters and I wanted to create a clothing brand with an athletic inspired aesthetic, and we began the creative process of figuring out what they liked, what they didn’t, and what would the ideal colors, fabrics, and patterns even look like.
My girls looked online and other places for inspiration to show us the type of products they liked. They researched prints they preferred. They had a strong point of view about fabrics—they wanted them to be soft. One day, we had all the Pantone color chips spread out on the table, and the girls each had a different opinion about what they liked. They polled their friends, so it was like informal consumer research, but there wasn’t a consensus, which led to the variety you see in the line of clothing.
Once we recorded input from my daughters and their friends, we took the best elements of different shorts and tops they liked and used it to create the ultimate fit for the shorts—the perfect length, leg opening, and waistband, so they could jump and move.
As we created each clothing item, I discovered how thrilled my daughters were to see their designs come to fruition. They wanted to wear the clothes right away, but seeing and holding them also gave them ideas for things they would do differently next time. The process was exciting and empowering for my daughters, and I watched their confidence grow. Still, they are teenage girls, which means they struggle with confidence sometimes. But I think they recognize that confidence is an attribute they need to possess. They can wear B+A and feel like themselves, not like a boy or like they think they should look.
This brand is about so much more than just clothes. It’s about helping teenage girls be part of a team while also being independent and growing personally. I want to see the girls gravitate toward this because they see the importance of the message. Girls can do anything—even create their own brand of clothing.
