“
The collection encourages one to look at the world from a different perspective
“
While studying International Studies and Political Science at the University of Washington, Debbie Roberts discovered her love of fashion during a trip to Perugia, Italy. She always had an interest in fashion and design, but during this trip she was surrounded by the beauty of this historic city, which drove her to enrol herself in the School of Apparel Design & Development at Seattle Central after graduating from the University of Washington. While studying design, Roberts learned the skills and knowledge necessary to bring her visions to life, and soon began to work as an assistant designer and materials developer at Eddie Bauer. Working there helped Roberts get a better understanding of how the seasonal calendar worked and all the thought and details that goes into designing and producing a collection. She learned how to properly communicate with garment factories and fabric mills, as well as solving and managing quality issues. The great opportunities that Roberts was presented with within her time working at Eddie Bauer helped her develop a network of friends and assets that helped her shape her line, Silvae. Roberts launched her line, Silvae, in 2013. Taken from the latin word meaning“ into the woods”, Silvae is a poetic womenswear line that has interest in playing a role in our visual history. Inspired by the moody weather, landscape, and mountains of the Pacific Northwest, Silvae draws the shapes found in nature into their designs. If you take a look at Silvae’ s designs, they are very organic and free flowing, taking very simple, yet modern, shapes and patterns. The pieces are meant to be wearable from day to night, from work to weekend, and posses personality and creativity that makes a statement. Since Silvae is a smaller brand, sourcing fabrics tends to be one of the most complicated and challenging aspects because of the large fabric minimums. Roberts tends to travel to LA for a fabric show where they offer a number of different mills that have more workable requirements. She creates her prints via digital printing, which is a newer technology that gives smaller brands the opportunity to create unique pieces without having large minimums.