Duchess by design
How Meghan launched her first fashion collection
When the Duchess of Sussex announced she was to become the royal patron of Smart Works at the start of this year, its organisers and volunteers could never have predicted how much was about to change.
Since 2013, the charity, which has eight centres in London, Manchester, Edinburgh, Leeds, Reading, Birmingham and Newcastle, has quietly helped more than 15,000 British women struggling back into employment via sessions combining personal styling and interview training.
But last week, Smart Works launched one of its most ambitious projects yet with the Duchess’s “Smart Set” collection, bringing together Marks & Spencer, John Lewis and Partners, Jigsaw and Misha Nonoo to sell clothes for their cause.
On Thursday, 160 people gathered in the rooftop garden of John Lewis on Oxford Street to hear the Duchess introduce the initiative. For every dress, suit, shirt or tote bag sold by each retailer, a like-for-like item will be donated to the charity, enabling volunteer stylists to dress another “client”, making her feel confident and presentable for an interview that might change her life.
The news went global, and one bag from the collection sold out online within hours.
Kate Stephens, the charity’s CEO, says that Meghan was hands-on from the beginning, bursting with ideas. Not only did she personally persuade some of the biggest high street rivals to collaborate, but by doing so she managed to get global attention for what the charity is trying to achieve.
So how did they manage to pull off
such a coup? “The idea came up pretty soon after she agreed to be our royal patron,” Stephens says.
“This collection was one of her first ideas as she had noticed from volunteering with us that there are certain items and sizes that we need a lot of. We’re not a shop, we’re not ordering in clothes, we rely on people’s donations.”
Stephens said that the Duchess personally contacted the brands in spring. Where the charity will typically receive items from stores that didn’t sell at the end of the season (eg 40 lilac jackets or orange bags), this way they will have a new set of products made exclusively for them. Marks & Spencer has created a Smart Set crêpe shift dress, John Lewis a leather tote bag, Jigsaw a black jacket and trousers and Misha Nonoo, a personal friend of the Duchess’s, her “perfect” white shirt.
“She cherry-picked these brands,” Stephens says. “It came from her understanding of which brands on the British high street are familiar to people and can be accessible in terms of sizing, price and regional reach.”
For the Duchess it was also about what would count as classics and essentials. “I thought, what are the traditional and quintessential British brands that I’ve been introduced to since
I moved here and I knew resonated with the Smart Works customer?” she said.
“For me that seemed obvious to be M&S and John Lewis, which I have worn quite a bit in the past year … and Jigsaw, because I had seen a campaign that they had done … highlighting the diversity of the UK and how that was a part of the fabric of the nation.”
For the big names, it was the direct contact from Meghan that led to an instant “yes” to taking part. Misha Nonoo tells The Sunday Telegraph: “It was the first time I’ve ever made something with truly inclusive sizing, as she wanted everything to be available in a size UK 6-24.
“She (Meghan) was very clear about what the goal was. She’s not a
micro-manage micro-manager, she is really trusts you to do your part.”
The next challe challenge was to determine what p pieces should be in the range. The ba bag that was “big enough to carry a CV” was on everyone’s wish l list.
“The Duchess h has been in our dressing rooms tr trying to find bags for our clients and kn knows it’s particularly hard,” says Stephe Stephens. “It’s a category that we don’t get as many donations for. Especially of the right types of bags to take to an interview.”
Timings for cre creating and planning the launch event, however, were a little more compl complicated with the Duchess being pr pregnant with Archie.
“She was think thinking at every step of the way about wh what she could do to boost the project,” project Stephens reveals. “We had to set a d date which worked with the royal cal calendar.”
One stage whic which the Duchess didn’t want to miss out on was capturing the promotional phot photography. Smart Works clients were we invited to take part in the photo shoot in August, and Meghan made a surprise s appearance from her short m maternity leave.
“It was really im important to her to be there,” says Ste Stephens. ns.
“It was a surpr surprise to the clients, they had n no idea, ea, so there was lots of s screaming ming and hugging when th they realised alised who was styling them for the he day.
“She was very hands-on h s-on and making everyone feel great.
It was amazing th that she e could be there to create ate
that magic.”