We want to give people living with disabilities achoice. Achoice in fashion. Achoice to be included. Achoice to be heard.
These were the founding principles on which I launched Christina Stephens - the inclusive, Brisbane-based fashion label, giving people the choice to feel confident and empowered in clothing that looks as good as it feels.
Our vision is to bring inclusive and adaptive clothing to mainstream fashion retailers. Launched in March 2020, we’re still in the early stages of normalising the current stigma around adaptive clothing, by creating pieces that are discreetly functional and fit for purpose but beautiful and desirable by customers with and without disabilities. (Watch this space Myer and David Jones!)
Inclusivity, adaptability and sustainability are the core business and design values of Christina Stephens. We choose to design pieces that aren’t just versatile, adaptive and cohesive, but also modest, inclusive and sustainable.
The Christina Stephens concept came about after my mum had a fall some years back and damaged her elbows. The injury prevented mum, who has always been very fashion and health conscious, from dressing with ease in her usual classy and understated style. Since then, she has developed arthritis in her shoulders which impacts the ease in which she gets dressed.
After researching the fashion available in the market for style conscious women living with short or long-term physical challenges, I realised there was a social and business opportunity in front of me. 20% of the population live with a disability, yet the proportion of beautiful, quality, and on-trend fashion available, is vastly lacking. Our vision is to not just bridge this gap from a product perspective, but that our mainstream media, marketing and advertising starts reflecting this new ‘normal’ too.
The journey to create Christina Stephens took over 18 months and a team of determined, hard-working, creative, problem-solving, supportive and inspirational women in Australia and overseas. From our pattern maker, production manager and manufacturer in Sydney, our marketing and branding team in Melbourne, fashion designer and marketing guru in Brisbane to our copywriter in Vancouver, and fabric production team in China. Not to mention the AMAZING and generous women who have formed our design focus groups.
It has been a journey of inspiration, education, new experiences, new friendships and a passion to provide more for women who have trusted us by sharing their stories, experiences and daily clothing challenges.
And the name…..this is also a special story (to me anyway). People always assume that it’s my name. But I wanted to create a label that sounded like a designer label, not one that reminded my clients of functional or clinical clothing. My mum’s name is Christine and my dad’s name is Stephen. The combination of names is just a little something that makes my business even more personal to me.
Thanks for your interest in Christina Stephens and your support for this movement!
Stay with us. Share your valuable thoughts and ideas. Tell your family and friends about us.
Jessie x
Founder, Christina Stephens.
