The Struggles and Empowerment of the Women-Led Fashion Start-Up: Interviewing Hemsley London, Hazey Daisy London, and Loved Again London

By Jordan Kessel

What does it mean to be a female entrepreneur in the fashion industry?

Apparently, this past year has been the first where female-led start-ups and businesses outnumber those led by men in the UK. According to the 2022 Rose Review – a treasury commissioned independent review of female entrepreneurship led by Alison Rose – over 140,000 women-led businesses have been established in the past year. The data indicates that the introduction of entrepreneurship studies to young women in universities and schools are a leading factor in this.

My business, a marketing and branding agency for fashion and lifestyle brands that I opened with my best friend from university, aligns with the Rose Review’s conclusion, and through the ‘river E Agency’ we have been confronted with the realities of women-led business start-ups.

Questions such as what it means to be a female entrepreneur, what the main struggles are and what it takes to run a successful business as a young woman, specifically in the fashion industry, have occupied my thoughts.

Three young brands, all women-led, took the time to discuss this topic with me. Here are their stories.

Hemsley London

Jayne Hemsley, a London College of Fashion graduate previously working in roles at Alexander McQueen, Martine Rose and Roland Mouret, launched her eponymous Hackney-based label Hemsley London in 2020. Shown consecutively at Berlin, London and Paris Fashion Week, the brand won Jayne the prestigious Premium Young Designer Award and a cult following.

The luxury streetwear brand specifically draws inspiration from the world of aviation and female pioneers, such as Bessie Coleman and Ethel Dare, who defied gravity and societal oppressions. Recently, Jayne has been designing an incredible collection that expresses a feeling of freedom and empowerment, which is much needed considering the political reality in Britain at the time of the brand launch.

Translating this precise vision has been a struggle that Hemsley has been putting a true emphasis on since opening the brand. She says: ‘Creating a fashion brand is creating a whole lifestyle; it embodies every part of you, which you need to translate to your customer. It’s impossible for one person to put this out within the seasonal time frames of the fashion calendar demands.’  She credits her team for the realisation of this vision and states, ‘It’s completely impossible to carry a label by yourself. Your team and support system around you are everything.’

Hemsley believes that much of her journey has been empowered by the female role models she’s had; many of her bosses within the industry have been women, and this has given her the confidence to embark on her own in an industry that is heavily dominated by men. She highlights how she feels very lucky to be London-based, as she believes it offers women opportunities to be seen as a professional – opportunities that are not always available elsewhere. 

Loved Again London

Ella Walford, founder of Loved Again London, a pop-up clothes swap event platform, agrees with this testament. As a University of the Arts London graphic design graduate, Ella’s career has been London based, working in roles at Jessica Russell Flint, London Art Fair and NOW Gallery, alongside ‘some seriously inspiring women’.

Loved Again London was originally an online platform for discussing and celebrating all things sustainable and second-hand. Its shift towards an in-person event platform has been an exciting prospect for Ella but has been the biggest struggle too. The brand had initially been set to launch in the Spring of 2019 in a Stoke Newington café, but due to the London lockdowns, ‘Not only was this event optimistically postponed, the cafe sadly didn’t survive the pandemic. That was a real low point for the brand and any prospects I had for it.’

The official launch happened on the 30th of April in partnership with Curious Kudu in Peckham. The platform puts collaboration with other women-led businesses at its forefront, collaborating for the launch event with Yu’tcha London, a matcha subscription service and Redenim, a sustainable reworked denim brand. Walford states: ‘In a world where many workplaces are still male-dominated, I would love to create a brand where women can confidently explore and develop their own passion projects.’ This connects to her own struggle to balance her full-time job while navigating the launch of her own passion project – Loved Again London.

Walford is most excited about having the opportunity to launch at a time when people are much more aware of their consumption and are interested in shopping more sustainably. She feels that this will help build an organic community around the brand. ‘In this respect, I feel really lucky that a lot of the hard work has been done for me. In a world where high fashion is expensive and inaccessible and second-hand often comes with a stigma of sorts, I am so passionate about creating a platform where these worlds collide and create something beautiful and unique.’

Hazey Daisy

Another brand pioneering sustainability is Hazey Daisy, founded by UCA Fashion Promotion and Imaging graduate Daisy Steel. Steel opened her sustainable luxury swim and resort wear brand in 2020 during lockdown after working at Topshop as a stylist.

When asked why she chose to start her own business, Steel said: ‘Since graduating from university, I found I couldn't express my creativity how I wanted to in any roles and felt I needed a sense of creative control’. Her love for 1970’s and 1980’s dance culture and Ibiza inspired Hazey Daisy’s unique aesthetic, creating timeless pieces that are released in sustainable one-time drops.

Ultimately, she dubs time management her biggest struggle. ‘Since opening my brand, I find I overcome problems almost daily, some bigger than others,’ she says. From navigating taxes to finding the right manufacturers, trying to play everyone's role can become overwhelming. As the brand is relatively new, only recently has she hired her first employee, which has allowed her to delegate and work in a more organised manner – just in time for the release of her second collection this summer.

Business and female-entrepreneurial aimed books and podcasts have been a great source of help for Steel in the process of building the brand. ‘I found it more relatable and inspiring listening to stories of other designers who are on a smaller scale – a fab podcast to listen to was ‘DesignertoDesigner’’. They have helped her overcome her struggles and motivated her positive mindset, which she claims is key to her progression and to her design process.

There is no doubt that there are struggles associated with being a business owner during the pandemic. These young women have each created something to be proud of.

Support young entrepreneurs. Support young women. Support your local small brands! And don’t forget to keep an eye out for these incredible small brands in the future.