This story was written during my time as an intern for Luxe and City.
Luxe and City’s Creative Council continues to draw in world-renowned artists to the Arizona community through local events such as Fashion Friday where models are displayed, traffic-stopping crosswalk runways happen, local vendors sell their pieces and much more.
Keesha Stillwell, creator of fashion brand Me Sweet Kee, originated from Boston and moved to Arizona primarily for the weather but has found Luxe and City to be a valuable resource for the fashion community. Stillwell explained she had been hearing about Luxe and City for the last three years through friend and designer Brenton Jones.
“Well, first of all, I've been hearing about First Fridays for so long. I've been waiting for my turn to jump in the ring and I am so impressed,” Stillwell said. “I had a lot of fun and I met so many people here. I'm very impressed. Everything is perfect and I can't wait for the next one.”
Describing herself as a, “Custom Urban Glamwear Designer” Stillwell started designing clothes to create a stage presence when she was a background singer for a variety of artists from Erykah Badu to Dave Matthews Band. Higher ups in the music industry didn’t want to hire stylists for her and the other background singers which led her to take costume design into her own hands.
“They wanted a certain style that they couldn't really explain, so that kind of pulled me into going to the Fashion Institute in New York, but I couldn't afford to stay there,” Stillwell said. “I took enough to learn pattern making and started creating my own things. The clientele was already set up, because all the people that were on tour already, they all were looking for performance wear and stuff, so I was like perfect. I’ll use you guys as my guinea pigs.”
Despite starting in fashion due to necessity, Stillwell grew up with her mother and sister being master seamstresses and has always had a fascination with sewing. Finding a passion in this career, she has been designing for over thirteen years. Over time, Stillwell has found herself embedded into the Arizona fashion community and took part in the 2022 Arizona Trending Awards and Fashion Show.
“They pretty much had this opportunity to showcase three other designers, Cielo The Creator and LaMark Cole and we just had a lot of fun. It was so amazing,” Stillwell said. “I presented something called, The Love Collection. I like to name my clothing and this was about Valentine's Day and pretty little frilly things.”
Stillwell’s favorite part of being a fashion designer is all of her collections, and how she continues to level up with each piece, however she hopes to see more designers in Arizona in the future and explained how there are a disproportionate number of stylists to designers.
“Like, what I do is I cut, sew, create straight from my hands and the things that I create are from scratch,” Stillwell said. “Out here, there's a lot more stylists than there are designers. So what I'm actually trying to do is start teaching, because I'm 46 years old. I'm pretty much at the end of my career.”
With Grammy Award winning clients and doing costume design for commercials for companies as big as ESPN, Stillwell believes everyone should at least learn the basics of sewing, especially those in the fashion industry.
“There's nothing like waking up and just cutting out a fresh piece of fabric,” Stillwell said. “So I would say if you're trying to be a designer, definitely learn how to sew even if you don't plan on selling your designs, at least learn the ways of the sewing machine. It gives you so much power. It gives you so much independence.”
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