wear it out

Wear it

by Kris Vagner out

If you thInK Reno Is all hoodIes and cowboy hats, meet fashIon desIgneR Kendal Vaughan

hey, Reno! What are you wearing? If you’re trying to sum up our collective fashion sense and your census sample comes from the streets or—ahem, certain newsrooms—you might conclude that we are a deeply casual city, in love with sneakers, hoodies and cowboy hats. Heck, I spot people in PJs in the grocery store on the regular. But peek behind the doors of our swankier nightclubs and into the studios of local fashion designers, and you’ll see that, when we clean up, we clean up good.

Twenty-four local and international fashion designers will take the runway July 2 at the Reno Fashion Show to show us how it’s done. RN&R caught up with one of them—Kendal Vaughan, founder of VonRoe

Fashion—to find out what it’s like to be the business of making people look great.

Vaughan says she’s addicted to hobbies. She’s not kidding. She’s a hairdresser, makeup artist, blogger, photographer and poet. She also creates garments, undergarments, thigh holster bags, leathers and furs for the

“sophisticatedly insane.” Often she starts with vintage garments from thrift shops and re-stitches them into one-of-a-kind outfits.

Describe your style.

VonRoe represents the eclectic maverick, the vixen, if you will, limit-pushing and artistic expression. The point is to expose people’s eccentricities, their oddities—to bring out their true beauty, who they really are, who they want to be as opposed to what people think they should be seen as, for the ones who want to step out of their comfort zone. The idea is to make a point, which is that there’s so much more to capture than what the eye sees at first glance.

What got you started in fashion?

My family’s been telling me that this is what I was going to do since I started walking. My whole life I’ve always imagined what I want to wear and how I want to express myself. All the clothes my grandmother or someone would buy—I had this inability to wear it the way it was. I probably started dedicating myself to it my freshman year of high school. I altered and changed everything. I never intended on making a fashion line. It was just solely for me. About a year ago I made the decision to make my fashion available to people. It’s about people being who they want to be. The most popular thing I hear is, “How did you pick this and that and that and have the balls to wear it out? But it looks great.”

What’s your most important goal as a designer?

I get asked so many questions: “Where do you get your style from? Why would you pick that?” It intrigues people to get to know who I really am. My biggest goal in this is to show that attitude and what VonRoe is. I want to show the world my style, my fashion, but I want to share with everybody. I want it to blow up, that’s for sure. I realized this is my biggest passion. I want VonRoe to be more than a fashion line, a way to live, a way to be.

What’s the most challenging part of your job?

The most challenging, I would say, is keeping my foot down in the fact that I don’t have limits, I’m not going to have limits. The designs and the vibe and the looks are definitely going to be neckbreaking, not conventional, not what everyone would see as being appropriate. Sometimes I have to stop and sit and tell myself, “Continue with my vision.”

Why do you love clothes?

Oh, God! I love clothes so much! I wrote a really short column expressing that same thing: “Fashion, it’s my life, my massive attraction, stories told by unspoken words, by sewing needles and fabric folds. The patterns are the roads, and the stitches are paths. … Poetry it is, this is vintage passion. It’s everything. It’s fashion.”

Where can people find your fashions?

On the web site: www.kendalvaughan.com.

The Reno Fashion Show takes place July 2 in the Grand Ballroom at Grand Sierra Resort, 2500 E. 2nd St. A runway show features men’s and women’s fashions by 24 local and international designers, including Project Runway alumni Richard Hallmarq and Emily Payne. Doors open at 6 p.m. The show starts at 7:30. Tickets are $25-50 at www.renovanity.com or $30+ at the door. The event is all-ages.

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This publication was supported by the Nevada State Division of Public and Behavioral Health through Grant Number 5U62PS003654-05 from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the offi cial view of the Divisionnor the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.