Runway to success
Alabama designers make their mark in the fashion world
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By Jennifer Kornegay
ll through its history, Alabama has produced
an abundance of artists. Our state’s rural landscapes, city streets, past, present and potential have inspired painters, photographers, writers, musicians and craftsmen to share ideas and weave stories in color, words, melodies and other materials. So it should come as no surprise that within Alabama’s borders there are quite a few artists who express themselves with wearable works, a.k.a. fashion designers. And they range from the famous looks of Natalie Chanin and Billy Reid to brand new up-and-comers whose names could soon be hanging in your closet.
Say “yes” to these dresses Heidi Elnora Baker
12 MAY 2017
Today, Heidi Elnora Baker is the creative force behind one of the most sought-after labels in wedding gowns – heidi elnora – and she’s living a dream she’s harbored since childhood. From dressing up in her grandma’s clothes as a youngster and sketching her own styles as a teen to buying her first sewing machine with high school graduation money, she’s always known she wanted to work in fashion. But how she was going to make it from her tiny rural hometown of Morris, Ala., into the fashion industry was something she wasn’t as sure of. As she was nearing graduation from Central Alabama Community College, she found herself at a crossroads. “I was there on a softball scholarship,” she says. “And I didn’t know what I was going to
do next. Money for moving forward to study fashion was an issue.” A full scholarship to the prestigious Savannah College of Art and Design provided the answer and a hands-on education in the basics like sketching, sewing and pattern making. “That’s where it all took off,” she says. When she graduated in 2002, she went to Atlanta to work for Carter’s designing baby clothes, where she stayed for four years. While there, she was chosen to be on the Bravo TV show “Project Runway.” After an accident brought her back home to Alabama to recover, she met a boy, fell in love and ended up marrying him and staying in her home state. She was enjoying nuptial bliss, but not her job. www.alabamaliving.coop