TALKS with Amy Tipton

3 min. read | Video + Interview | A.M.

Intro

Amy Tipton is the Founder and Owner of independent fashion retail business Sassafras in downtown Seattle. Having founded her company in 2012 after a 14-year career at Microsoft, Amy now works with independent Northwest creators and fashion brands to curate custom and ready-to-wear collections for sale at her downtown location and online.

In our Talk with Amy, we discover her current business model as well as how she and the 50+ brands she interacts with are evolving with the post-pandemic consumer dynamic.

Summary

While the world comes to terms with the inevitable restart of fashion production at scale, many local businesses have missed key production dates resulting from global manufacturing shutdowns, and have instead pivoted to solve our community’s immediate need for homemade face masks and other personal protective equipment.

While this has been a very helpful option for local fashion houses and manufacturers, it is not a permanent solution and will require additional and incremental adjustments to maintain a path to solvency.

Amy chose to pivot Sassafras into a drop-shipment business model, which has proven helpful to her and the brands that continue to reach out to her for support. But the mounting pressures that accompany brick-and-mortar businesses, especially rent and lease agreements, cannot be abated indefinitely.

While the future of independent fashion retail in the Pacific Northwest is uncertain, it is becoming apparent that strong visual storytelling, network effects and satellite fulfillment methods are viable half-measures for the foreseeable future.

plaid and red

Sassafras began with a dream connected deeply to the joy that comes from exploring fashion in unique ways that crossed dimensions and mixed eras. But Amy isn’t the type of person to rely upon dreams alone. She is a person of measured and intensional action, creating logical steps that allow her to test concepts before deploying them in practice.

“I had this vision of a shop that sold second-hand clothing that you could alter. And I would do the alterations. And I was making my own designs, with dresses, skirts, tops. And I decided to practice having a retail shop by participating in all these art markets and schlepping my stuff everywhere, and talking with people, just seeing if I really liked working with the public.”

Sassafras opened their doors to the public in 2012. Since then, the business has evolved beyond its original vision, and Amy has become a stockist with over 50+ independent Northwest brands represented in her product offerings.

“I know every single person who sells here personally. I’ve met them. I know what their studios look like. I visit with them. We’re in close relationship with all the makers here.”

Amy’s journey into fashion began like so many do. She was exposed to the art and business of dressmaking at an early age, and felt fashion’s call intensify as she grew older.

“My grandmother was a seamstress by trade. And I had a very particular style, even when I was five years old. All of my dresses were plaid, and all of my shoes were red. So I had my particular tastes. But I was definitely exposed to the sewing part of [fashion] from my grandmother who would let me pick from her scrap pile anything I wanted and make little purses and skirts and things from the time I was probably seven years old.”

Amy carried her fashion interests well into high school, exploring a mixed-media approach to fashion design by creating patchworks and applying paint to her garments. The goal was originality, and the general sensibilities of the commercial fashion trends of the time were a blank canvas upon which Amy would leave her indelible mark. And adding variety by way of mixing eras—wearing a 1920s hat with a 60s cardigan and her hand-painted jeans—added to the joy of fashion as a form of artistic rebellion. And Amy was surely a rebel with a just cause.

Barlie B. ROSEWOOD WRAP TOP

Via Coyote WISPY WANDERINGS NECKLACE IN SUNSET

Poppyseed Clothing TIE SWEATER IN BLUE STRIPE

Stone Crow Designs RIBBED STRETCH JEGGINGS IN BLUE

While the showroom has been closed throughout the shelter-in-place mandates, Amy shows up to work everyday making face masks and coordinating deliveries, looking forward to a future in which in-person connections are commonplace once again.

Visit Sassafras online today to see the latest fashion available for delivery, and follow them on Instagram .

In our new series called TALKS, we reflect on the fashion industry in the Pacific Northwest. We'll look at where it has been, where it is now, and how we can move forward in a unique, small, yet financially important and growing market.

Editor’s note: We experienced some technical difficulties with the video recording, though they are minor. We thank you for your understanding. We do not make a commission on any links provided herein. This article has been updated with the full interview video.