AWAVEAWAKE: Art, Spirituality, and Sustainable Fashion with Jaclyn Hodes
NATURE AND INTENT JOURNAL profiles conscious brand owners that create a meaningful impact through living their nature and intent.
Earlier this year, we connected with the amazing Jaclyn Hodes, founder and creator of conscious and sustainable fashion brand, AWAVEAWAKE. She currently resides in Bali, Indonesia where her clothing collection is also produced. Jaclyn designs effortless and beautiful pieces and has been ahead of the sustainable fashion trend for at least a decade. Each garment is made with ethically sourced fabric and dyed with natural plants. She shares her personal journey navigating working in the fashion industry while remaining authentic to her vision of building a brand. Read on to learn more about the inspiring creative, Jaclyn Hodes of AWAVEAWAKE.
Can you share your journey and what experiences inspired the creation of AWAVEAWAKE?
Jaclyn: In the years leading up to creating AWAVEAWAKE, I had begun to greatly reconsider my relationship to creating fashion and art and what that might look like when integrating an expanding awareness of my purpose on this planet.
At first, I called these studies and practices “spirituality,” but further on the journey, I began to drop the need to identify with systems or technologies and sought to simplify my practices to a more intimate and direct connection with Spirit, that I felt is also interchangeable with Nature. And from that place I began to create accordingly. I didn’t know to create from any other place than from one that engages the ideas of “feminine power” and so this means not compromising for profits and not taking necessarily, a linear route towards success, but a spiraling one.
I had spent the first three decades of my life studying, engaging in, and making art. From being a very young girl playing in my mother’s wardrobe, I dreamt of being a designer and owning a store full of opulent labels. In high school, I found creativity among social movements, specifically one where animal rights and veganism coincided with a music scene in suburban basements. From there I attended a college where I was exposed to interdisciplinary methods that taught us to merge all our interests, studying with artists and theoreticians who embodied their work in nearby New York City. Just after I lived in Paris, working as a stylist on editorials and shows, then returning to New York to attend Fashion and Textiles graduate program at FIT. I studied the history of historical garments and accessories, while I assisted top notch stylists, editors, and collaborating with photographers to build up my own portfolio. I was always intrigued by “conscious lifestyle movements, natural beauty and healing modalities.”
AWAVEAWAKE’s emergence was not created out of thin air, but an amalgam of all these lifelong inclinations and experiences.
What is the significance of the name, “AWAVEAWAKE?”
Jaclyn: When I was conjuring the name for the project, I was surprised when it came through to me but it was clear to me it was “it.” The compound word created a sense of two things for me with a possibility for many more interpretations. The first reference was to the energy on the planet and the mass awakening that has been happening specifically felt over the past decade and more increasingly from the Earth’s communications with us, awakening the sacred relationship we might have to her individually and collectively. The other reference was to the relationship between humans and the environment like the wave created by nature and the wake that is the manmade imprint onto the environment. The name also had a visual resonance, as it looked like a weaving of letters together.
“Over the many years, my path of ancestral healing has taken a life of its own, and I’ve solely followed the call. This led me back home to my Motherland of Mexico, where I began to gather the seeds of my grandmothers and reclaim my own roots. ”
What is your creative process and how do you get inspired to design each collection?
Jaclyn: I am inspired by nature first and foremost, and then the color palettes are revealed to me over a season. I gather up references from nature, art, and objects. I work with them and how they tell their story together. I work mostly with silk. Silk is a very romantic and poetic material. It is ancient and wise and rare, and there’s a very direct relationship to the plant dyes and that material.
I have many references stylistically that are always with me, but at this point the AWAVEAWAKE woman is pretty solidified. I know who she is and what she might want to wear. I studied in the archives at the Costume Institute at both FIT and the MET in New York and so I naturally am referencing dresses from many decades and on occasion from centuries prior. Again it's so many things, places I am living, books, songs. It’s less of a formula and more of a free form assemblage of my life. Pieces are rather minimal--it’s a contrast between my personal intimate references and my desire to create somewhat of a more blank canvas for the women who wear AWAVEAWAKE, which is one of the most enduring ethos of the brand.
How did you design your lifestyle so that you get to split your time living in Bali, Paris, and Los Angeles? What practices keep you grounded and how does this align with your brand values?
Jaclyn: I was living in New York for quite a while and though New York has worlds upon worlds within, it didn’t feel quite right for me to try and make it a proper home. I discovered that my spirit and perhaps even my body likes to live nomadically and it’s the most authentic mode of living for me at the moment. Through sourcing materials and researching artisanal plant dyers, I began to spend time in Asia. A few years later, I attempted to change course and “settle down” because Los Angeles always seemed inevitable. The path for me seemed to open up effortlessly to make the move there but three years later, I got the strong hit while in Paris that it was time to leave. It was a struggle, trusting in the universe and timing. All of that sounds wonderful and I live by it, but there were some real “dark nights of the soul” moments grappling with the disappointment that this chapter didn’t yield more stability but instead set me back out “on the road.” Being open to the evolution of your life and allowing other things to lead you to your destiny can have a powerful impact on your direction but it requires constant “course correction” and listening to your internal compass. And all of this requires a level of freedom, for me that requires not having attachments, as things didn’t quite coalesce for me in the “settling down” chapter- no children, no solid romantic relationships, not having set up a brick up store or a design studio…
Can you describe the plant dyeing process? What are the benefits of the plant dyes used in your current collection?
Jaclyn: When we first started the brand we worked with a masterful dyer who used extracts from plant parts from all over the world and she did this in machines. At first we used a washing machine and later in commercial dye machines--I found this method very inspiring because of its scalability. When she ended up closing her studio to get into a larger natural pigment enterprise, it was around the same time I ended up in Bali. So I went to the dye house here that I had heard about years prior and went straight to work and have been working with artisans here ever since. They gather the plant materials locally, pulverize the plant materials--leaves, bark, husks or flowers, they then heat the plant matter in water and create vats of color. Then there are mixtures of the color that create the various shades. Then the excess waste is run through a system where pond plants filter the water out so that it’s safe to dispose of. Indigo dyed pieces have their own process where the leaves are fermented and a dye vat is created. Artisans rinse and hang the material all by hand. It’s truly this additional step in our process, taking sometimes weeks to a month. Often it's hard to replicate shades from the samples to the production end but we try to get the most approximate. Additionally, we aim for evenness in the tone which is hard to achieve by hand...if you look at most natural dyers they tend to do more tie-dyes which are easier to achieve.
The benefits of wearing garments that are plant dyed are that you know for sure there are no synthetic chemicals involved in the process, it is truly the most healthy for your body as our skin absorbs way more than we want to begin to realize. This is not only for the benefit of the earth in the production process but for the lifespan of the garment, as washing clothing if it’s not as chemical free as possible, breaks down in the water and releases microplastics and other particles over time. Additionally, each plant used has medicinal properties. Wearing the plants will offer a kind of homeopathic dose of these properties. We cannot say that they will heal you, but it's worth exploring the sensations of and I love to share the plant properties with the customers, it's just another level of enchantment. The color itself when made of natural material has another worldly luminosity. And color psychology then becomes another point of conversation. The magic continues to unfold--and you thought it was just another slip dress!
I am both turned on by movement and living in several places but my programming has me sometimes feeling sadness that I don’t have tethers to just one place, so at moments I question the workability of this but I’m only a year out so we shall see…
Conversely the beauty of this is immense, I have a rich and diverse community and powerful deep relationships in all those places, including Los Angeles. My business is intrinsic to my life and so I am led from place to place according to its needs, as my own.
Being near and in the ocean is grounding and inspiring to me as well as movement practice--dance in all forms and connecting to pleasure and joy in whatever seems to touch on that. Anyone who observes my work might notice that the body and movement has been contemplated a bit here. Dance is my long time love and no matter how far I stray from a regular practice of it, it is always there to heal me and uplift me.
After years of other rigorous practices, I have simplified things:
Primarily plant based products that are as natural as possible in food and beauty and clothing. My wardrobe being mostly plant dyed AWAVEAWAKE silks and cottons, is incredibly easy to travel with. It all packs down to nothing and works perfectly throughout seasons- just with some overlayers for more temperate and less tropical climates. I can’t stress enough that how we clothe and adorn ourselves is so important- the materials, the intentions and most of all the way they make us feel.
My practice is sovereign and intuitive- I sit and clear my mind, I move accordingly...
Having incredible people around me who inspire with their authenticity and integrity is key as well. No matter what and where, it’s really always a community effort.
Living outside of your comfort zone, connecting to people from all cultures and with all types of backgrounds and perspectives is one of the truest ways to stay grounded. Breathing practices, adaptogens, plant medicines, are also all great to heal and propel us further along our path, but I’ve now been walking it long enough with eyes open that I see so much that gets twisted and contorted when we make ourselves precious and untouchable.
With social media being a huge part of building a brand, how do you use it to grow your brand while remaining authentic.
Jaclyn: I am trying to navigate through social media and share more. I am a private person and not as comfortable sharing about myself, but I can also see that social media as a positive space in that it's giving me the opportunity to express myself through the brand, giving me more of a place to express my values. I know I am supposed to share more of myself but that’s a process...working on what that would all mean for me and the collection in 2020.
As one of the leading conscious fashion brands using eco & sustainable fashion production practices, how have you seen the industry shift over the years?
Jaclyn: I think it’s amazing that there’s a flurry of conversation in the industry and it’s no longer niche to work this way. When I began I was given the advice to lead with style and then talk about the principles behind the brand after. However in a lot of ways, brands are doing more talking, more lip service that might yield activism rather than necessarily committing to using more conscious materials and modes of production and the CFDA is giving them attention for this. Honestly, it’s really about connections and popularity and some good fortune. Even the way we got into print, US Vogue or French Elle was because of direct connections that we had even though they happened naturally. We have never had public relations representation that lead to any of the opportunities we’ve had. They have all come organically.
It’s really hard to track and discern what is truly “sustainable” or I prefer to say “ecological,” because for example, “end of roll” is now a hot trend though it’s questionable that it’s more than a keen business decision on the part of the designer- discounted fabric that is likely passing through many world markets and hands before it would ever end up in a landfill. However, the quality of a lot of end of roll contains synthetics and other chemically treated clothing that you likely wouldn’t treasure as heirlooms and then they would end up in the landfill or washing them would release microfibers that make up much of plastic pollution and more insidious on our health as well. Our precept is to be as natural and low impact materially as possible. Natural dyeing is an extra step, like intricately embroidering a textile but it's not noticeable to a less refined eye. But as our sensory systems expand and we become more refined, it will be quite obvious what is most touched by what is still natural- as we lose connection through our technologies the most precious of luxuries will be our connection to Mother Earth. Our clothing connects you quite directly to the experiences so that’s why we call ourselves “luxury fashion” - nature is the true luxury in this post industrial world.
So grateful to feature an inspiring conscious creative leading with her nature and intent.
Follow Jaclyn on Instagram @awaveawake. Lovely model is Chantal @chantal.ka.
Photos and interview by Kristine Lo.
