The GO Clothed Company, is a Spanish registered fashion and accessories brand born in 2018. A brand committed to innovation with style, seeking through the fusion between tradition and avant-garde to create different and modern products.
”At GO Clothed, we create our products in an artisan way, combining new technologies (laser cutting and 3D printing) with traditional techniques.” – Macarena GO, designer of GO Clothed Company
For GO Clothed fashion and its accessories are tools with which to show the personality of each one without barriers. The designer believes in the perfection of the imperfect, in the complement of the incomplete and in the respect for the different.
”Quality and love for the good work of things are the basis of our work, and participate in the development towards a better world our guide.” – Macarena GO, designer of GO Clothed Company
This project is an exit from the path established in the life of its creators, which a turn of destiny forced them to take. GO Clothed was born after experiencing in first person the fragility of life and the speed of time.
GO Clothed is the project of the designer Macarena Gutiérrez Ortega and her partner, and sister, Marina.
INTERVIEW WITH MACARENA GO, designer of GO Clothed Company
33: When did you first realize you wanted to become a fashion designer?
I think it has always been inside me, but I wasn’t able to see it. I have always been a very creative person, and fashion has been one of my passions since I can remember, but I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to create it. That is why I studied a degree on Design and Image Management, but when I finished I had the feeling that I was missing something, because I liked graphic design, interior design or image strategy but I didn’t see myself working on it the rest of my life. It was then, when I finally decided to get my fashion studies with a Fashion Design and Technology postgraduate master, called AMD at Madrid’s Polytechnic University. This master opened my mind, and for the first time I was doing something I didn’t get bored about it, every sketch, every idea simply made me feel alive.
33: When did you land your first internship and what was the most valuable thing you learned from this experience?
My first fashion internship was at the Spanish brand Miguel Marinero. Due to my personal situation, I couldn’t finish it, but what I learnt the time I was there was the value of quality and identity, and of knowing and feeling what you try to show and inspire with the collection. And also, the importance of organization and being able to improvise when things don’t go as planned.
33: What was your first job out of college, and how did you land that position?
My first job out of college is my brand, GO Clothed.
My father was terribly hit by a car my last year of college in 2015, and during the time I was finishing college and my master on Fashion Design, my father was trying to recover first at the hospital and afterwards in a neurological rehabilitation clinic. When I was starting my internship in Miguel Marinero, in 2017, they sent my father finally home and that changed all the plans we had. After thinking all the options, I decided to take care of my father and start my own project at home, so I think destiny brought me here.
33: Define sustainable concept nowadays in fashion industry in five words.
Slow fashion is the new black.
33: If you could go back and tell yourself one thing before beginning your career what would it be? What was the biggest rookie mistake you made when just starting out?
We are a young brand, but what I will say to myself is to always remember that there isn’t only one path to reach a goal and that sometimes you have to pause a dream to reach other that will help you with the first one.
For sure we still have a lot of mistakes to make, but I think my biggest mistake was thinking that being young didn’t allow us to ask for a place in the industry from the beginning.
33: What is one thing you look at the models for your campaigns?
Naturality, balance and elegance are facts that I love, but what I look first is for someone capable of expressing not only posing.
33: What role do you think social media plays in fashion today?
I think social media is an instrument that let us show the essence of the brand, the behind the scenes, what it takes to create what we design and not only the final product.
33: What is your favorite and NON-favorite part about being part of the fashion industry?
What I like of being at the fashion industry is all the different atmospheres we can create, making possible many ways of expression and even social movements. Maybe what I don’t like, although this is rather a personal opinion, is that with the great growth that the industry has had, it has not been able to keep the essence of fashion as a sector with quality and durable products, in the mind of consumers. Today, it seems that clothing is something to wear and throw away when the trend stablished changes to another one, and this message has penetrated society and makes it difficult for young brands like ours, where products are made by hand, in limited editions, with the highest qualities and guarantees, because now it seems that the only thing that matters to the consumer is to find the trend of the moment with the lowest price possible, except for iconic aspirational brands.
33: How do you want people to feel when wearing your BRAND?
I believe fashion gives us the opportunity of expressing our personality and that is why, what I want people to feel when they wear GO Clothed is themselves. Their personality is what is going to bring to life my designs, and the only thing I want my products to give them is the confidence and authenticity to show themselves as they are or as they want to be seen.
33: Can you tell us how your brand makes a difference in fashion industry?
I think what sets us apart in the industry is our social conscience. We love glamor and flashes, but we are also aware of the social and global problems that surround us. And from the beginning we want our work to help those who need it in those fields where fashion design does not have so much capacity for action. For example, we are now donating a 20% of each sale to the DACER Foundation, a Spanish organization that research’s new ways of early stimulation and rehabilitation for people that had suffered brain injury due to an accident or a disease.
33: News on the way regarding your next collection?
For our next collection, I can advance that we are going to introduce new materials and textures and that our first results look very, very good.
33: What do you think is the biggest challenge for a fashion designer?
To be able to balance the cost of creativity and know that consumers are the hardest judges.
33: There is one important person, in your life, who pushes and motivates you to believe in yourself?
My mother, with no doubt, she is the one that has always be by my side, couldn`t have asked for a better supporter. She has always believed in me, and with all the things we have suffered during these past years, she has never given up, she was the one that pushed me to study what I love, to create my brand… I can say that everything I have achieved is mostly thanks to her.
33: How do you think a big brand should motivate their collaborators and team members?
Believing and trusting them. I think that what can motivate someone the most is to feel that they are part of the something, and that their work, whatever it is, is part of the project. If you are able to make people love their work, you will have great workers, but if they also love working with you, you will have the best team.
33: How do you think sustainable can play an important role in fashion industry?
I think the sustainable era is an objective that every industry should have started working on, and I believe that fashion is the industry that can faster adapt to new ways of production because in reality is the base of our work. As a centenary industry, we know how to produce in a responsive way, we know how to reuse things to create new ones. I think the fashion industry knows what to do but the change is not easy because being sustainable means changing a lot of things, not only how to produce the energy with which we switch on the machines, and I think it is something we are not thinking about. Being sustainable means a change of roles, a change in the way we consume, a change in the way we work which affects workers, not only machines. I think the problem with sustainability is more in how to design and prepare the world for the transition between two ways of life, than in finding new energy forms. Saying that you will stop smoking is easy, but to actually stop smoking, is not.
33: Describe us you as a designer and how your feelings influence the creativity process?
I must admit that I am a bit chaotic and I mostly design in my mind and start trying directly with the hat, the trims, acrylics… while in others I sketch first, sometimes I just stay in front of the mirror with the hat on traying shapes. I have a lot of fun! Feelings are very important for me in general, and I can say they are essential for my creative process. When I am feeling bluer, I usually have better ideas because my mind goes slower because when I am happy, I can’t stop creating.
33: Would you like to involve other accessories designers in your future projects?
Sure, I think that collaboration can be great.
33: What do you think is the main mission of the CO-BRANDING concept?
I think that as a marketing strategy its mission is to bring benefits to the brands involved. The idea is great because it opens you to new publics and product lines without assuming all the cost yourself, and if it is done under fair conditions for the companies involved and the final consumer, I think it’s a great opportunity to grow as a brand. The important thing here is to be able to maintain each brand identity safe.
33: How fashion PR agencies can help more the brands and what skills a good fashion PR should have in your opinion?
We actually don’t have any PR, so I don’t know too much about them, but what I will look for in a PR is someone that, apart from knowing the industry and having contacts, is honest and loyal, and that is going to tell you the truth despite the consequences because I think it must be someone you can trust on.
33: What designers inspire you and why?
I watch all the collections I can because from each one you always find something that can inspire you. That is why I have a very mix list, but from all my references, I have in a special place to Ellie Saab, since I can remember, the beauty and sophistication he always creates has inspired me. The fluid sculptures of Stéphane Rolland and the organic force his designs transmit are amazing. The last collections of Iris van Herpen blow my mind. And with no doubt, Karl Lagerfeld and his capacity of creating “total” collections where every accessory, every detail from the biggest one to the smallest one, from head to toe, was perfectly put together in the most balanced and rocking styles.
33: There is anyone special who would like to meet in person?
I will love to meet all of them, if Karl was here, I would have chosen him, but as he left us, I probably say Ellie Saab, because he is my childhood icon.
33: What do you think about the opportunity of selling your collections online nowadays?
As a consumer and brand owner I think that online shopping is great, because opens you the door to multiple markets without moving from the atelier. But we must not think that being online is easier than being in the street, because in the real world you know how many streets you can find, and which streets are better. But in the internet, there are almost infinite “streets” where people can buy, and you don’t even know in which street you are if you don’t work.
Macarena GO, The Designer
April 1994, always creative and passionate about fashion studied Integral Design and Image Management at the Rey Juan Carlos University of Madrid. In 2017 she studied the AMD fashion design and arquitecture postgraduate at the Polytechnic University of Madrid, where she confirmed her passion, exhibited her designs at the V Emerging Design Month Exhibition of the Costume Museum of Madrid, and made her first fashion show at the Fusion A Festival of Arenas de San Pedro. At the end of 2017, she decided to create GO Clothed, which at the beginning of 2019 has already been at NYFW as part of the independent brands selected for Flying Solo NYFW show.
”Adapt to what life and time brings to your path, but don’t adapt your dream to life or time.” – Macarena GO
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