Fashionable Francophiles: Meet Please Dress Up!By Justin Juul
Please Dress Up! is a clothing company run by Grant Doolittle and Judy Berbarian, two artists who live in near the Panhandle. If you’ve noticed all the girls rocking stripy shirts and pencil pants in the last few months, it’s because of them.
SFBG: So what’s your deal?
Judy Berbarian: My name’s Judy Berbarian and this is Grant Doolittle and we make up the label Please Dress Up! We’re custom clothiers/fashion designers.
SFBG: What’s the general idea behind Please Dress Up!?
Doolittle: Well, it’s just as the name states, really. We want people to dress up and we want to create unique pieces that are timeless in both style and in construction so they can do it. The name Please Dress Up! came to us after realizing what direction we wanted to take our clothing. It's clear and direct and people get the message right away, I think.
SFBG: Do you fit in with any fashion trends, like a specific school of fashion or whatever?
Berbarian: Our work is rooted in the tradition of French couture: custom made-to-measure garments all available in different fine fabrics. We don’t pay much attention to trends, but we do admire other designers. Some of our favorites are Balenciaga, Viktor and Rolf, Yves Saint Laurent, Christian Dior, and John Galliano.
SFBG: What about local designers? Are you part of an indie fashion movement or something?
Berbarian: We’re pretty separate from any scene, but we do admire some local designers. Al from Al's Attire in North Beach is our favorite. He’s a true craftsman and his work is just amazing. We’d love to have a shop just like his once we get a little more settled. As far as us fitting in to the design scene here, it’s been kinda hard. San Francisco used to be a Mecca for designer and high-quality clothing, but the industry has sort of disappeared and so have most of the resources for designers like us. All we have is each other to push our creativity further. On the flipside though, the indie designer scene here is special because it’s so raw. Also, people here really want to support locally made crafts. That’s why all the indie festivals have been doing so well lately.
SFBG: So how did you guys get into the fashion thing? Did you go to fashion or design school or anything?
Doolittle: Nope. No school for me.
Berbarian: Me neither. I’ve been sewing since I was 14 though. I always wanted to do this, but my Aunt discouraged me. It’s was kind of weird because she always made all my clothes, yet she wanted me to be a doctor or a lawyer or something. But I just wanted to be like her and make clothes. I was doing it on my own for a while and then Grant came along. We’ve been friends for seven years now, and we’ve been living together for like a year.
SFBG: How did you guys meet and decide to get together?
Berbarian: We were neighbors in Seattle and then I moved down here. Grant came to visit me one time and he just never left. I was doing the sewing thing out of this cold moldy basement and Grant was like “teach me how to sew!” So we just started spending all of our time in that basement. I remember feeling bad because the space was so small. Grant had to hunch down the whole time. Eventually we got this house and painted every room a different color. We work from here now and spend pretty much all of our time at home.
SFBG: So Grant, You didn’t make clothes before you meant Judy?
Doolittle: No, I did. By the time I met Judy I had been screen-printing shirts for years. I got bored with that though and I wanted to do something more. I mean, everybody makes t-shirts, you know?
SFBG: Do you guys have a pretty big following now? I see your stuff all the time. It seems like a gang or something.
Berbarian: We’re doing pretty well actually. We sold out our first boutique in the Mission and every time we do something we sell out pretty quick it seems.
Doolittle: We also do a lot of street marketing, so you may have seen our stuff other places too.
Berbarian: And we did a street fashion show for our latest line, all the French stuff, at Still Life in NoPa. That got our name out there a lot.
SFBG: What’s up with the French stuff anyway? I heard you’re moving there. Why would you do that when you’re having so much success here in SF?
Doolittle: France is such a major capital for fashion and we’re just ready to take it to the next level. Being from San Francisco is good for us. We can take the success we’ve had here and apply it to what we find in France. The whole “local designer” thing isn’t as big out there so we’ll be sort of a unique voice, I hope. Plus, there’s just a lot more resources out there. High-end buyers, and stuff.
SFBG: Do you speak French? It seems so ballzy to just pack up and move to a foreign country.
Berbarian: Well, Paris is really the center of the fashion world and we think people are sort of seeking young talent and a fresh take on things. But to answer your question, no, we don’t speak fluent French, but we’ve been studying it for a long time. Our whole house is decked out with French labels. We have words all over the walls, the clocks, the toilets, everything.
Doolittle: And we just got a really nice French roommate to help us out.
SFBG: Awesome, French roommates are the best. Are you gonna stick with the French themes for a while then?
Berbarian: No, that was a one-time thing for Still Life. Right now, we’re working on our spring summer 2009 collection. It’s gonna be a lot of really fine silk and cotton knit dresses, tops, skirts, and of course capes. We love capes. We’re going to be hand-dying a lot of our stuff with really bright colors. It’s gonna be awesome and we’ll be premiering the line in October down in Silverlake.
SFBG: Sounds good. Where can we find your stuff right now, though?
Doolittle: You can still find our Fall Collection at Still Life, but we’re mostly focusing on custom made items which we sell through our website. We also do small off-season collections and sell them at several stores like The Painted Bird, Candy Store, and Harputs Market.
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