Making her own dreams happen
Rosalyn Vitualla has always had a killer work ethic and a desire for lovely clothes. Now she combines the two.
WHEN you’re the ninth kid out of 11 living hand to mouth in the Philippines, the only clothes you ever get to wear are hand-me-downs that have already had plenty of handing down.
That’s one of the reasons Rosalyn Vitualla was drawn to making brand new, stylish clothes.
‘‘When I was very young I wanted a different dress for every day of the week, that was my dream. And different shoes. And bags.’’
Now as the owner of Missy’s Room in Wellington’s Old Bank Arcade she is surrounded by plenty of beautiful, new dresses. She makes them all herself, working at her sewing machine in the corner of the store when there are no customers to look after. She also sells retro and vintage jewellery and sunglasses, something she has done since she came to New Zealand and opened a number of second hand stores in various spots around Wellington.
Nowadays she is a pocket rocket of fashion in Wellington, ready for action at any time. In fact, you can pop into her store, pick out the material you want, and she can have a new garment finished and custom fitted in five hours.
She says focuses on a 1950s-inspired style mostly, and which are the types of dresses most popular with her customers, she says.
‘‘It’s very flattering style – feminine, fun and easy to wear.’’
She makes them out of cotton, linen and silk which she sources from a number of manufacturers.
Vitualla, 45, says hard work was a given growing up poor. But she also had an entrepreneurial streak that helped make some money for the family, which needed all the cash it could get.
‘‘I grew up in a place – Leyte – where typhoons hit almost every year and our house was often blown away. Our crops and animals and other belongings would be gone and we would have to start all over again,’’ she says.
Aid, if it came, would be slow getting there and it wasn’t unknown for the family to survive on coconuts for a month.
Even getting to school was a mission for the kids – they had the choice of crossing two rivers where the water was waist deep, or else there was a two-and-a-half hour walk.
Luckily her Dad was a carpenter as well as a farmer, and her Mum was his assistant so they were pretty self sufficient.
‘‘They made our little home together and most of our kitchen utensils are made by them from clay and wood, including the pots and cutlery.
‘‘We helped our mum make mats using flax to insulate our house, and for beds.’’
‘‘I started selling stuff when I was 7, when I was old enough to count money. My father was a great cook and every Saturday I went to the market to sell his food and on Sunday I would sell our homegrown vegetables at the market.
‘‘When I was around 10 years old a relative gave us her old sewing machine and I made pillowcases to sell to my teachers.’’
In her teenage years they moved to another area, less prone to typhoons, where the school was a lot closer to home. But it didn’t blunt her entrepreneurial drive.
‘‘After school I would rush home and cook pancakes to sell to my schoolmates as they passed by. From early age I’ve learned how to trade.’’
She went to university for a year and a half but dropped out to earn some money. She became a secretary for a construction firm in Davao and then became a liaison person helping organise building projects.
‘‘My written English was not good but I do like talking.’’
She became a licensed real estate dealer, sold two houses and then moved to Wellington in 1998 after meeting a New Zealander.
Though the relationship didn’t last, she was determined to do well in her own business.
She started up a secondhand shop based at the front of a garage in Constable St, in Newtown, while she lived out the back. But she also had a regular job in a rest home and did babysitting as well to raise some extra cash.
The shop was called Missy’s, after her daughter, one of her three children. She would open it when she could get to it from her rest home job.
She sold a range of women’s clothing at her store, as well as accessories and jewellery, some of which she made. At one stage she had three stores going, including two on Cuba St. But she decided to get out of the secondhand side of things and wanted a place where she could be based to sell her own dresses.
So she rented the store in the Old Bank Arcade in 2015 and made it her manufacturing base as well. When there are no customers she can cut and stitch and iron dresses, so there’s always something to do.
When she’s not in the store she’ll go off on the adventure of looking for vintage clothing, accessories or fabrics she wants to make into her 50s style dresses.
‘‘I believed in slow fashion – making good quality clothes that will last for years.’’
She thinks that is what makes her shop unique.
‘‘People can come in and try a few dresses to find the style that suits them, they can choose a fabric that we have or they can bring their own.
‘‘I also do adjustments on an existing dress if they find one they like but isn’t quite right fitting – at no extra charge – and that usually takes 30 minutes.’’
She has gift vouchers too which are always popular, especially at Christmas. And if the recipients don’t want a dress, they can put the vouchers towards the NZ-made jewellery she stocks.
She has some advice though for anyone starting out with their own business, in whatever area, and that’s to be frugal, and to work hard.
‘‘I started my business with my credit card, and I kept my job at the rest home,’’ she says.
Cashflow is critical in the early days and a regular wage helps cover all the start-up and early operating costs.
And don’t go in all guns blazing.
‘‘You can start little, and grow things organically,’’ she says.
Speaking of such things, her main hobby outside of work is gardening. She has a vege garden and she loves planting trees around her home in Southgate.
And she’s very happy with her wee shop. ‘‘I’m doing what I love,’’ she says.