THE #bodypositive and #exclusivelyinclusive approAch to offering actors or fashion clients the service every human being deserves.

and ensuring THat ResPEctful, considerate and AppRopriate/non-complicit actions and attitudes are at the forefront whilst measurements and wardrobe/costume related conversations are being held.

now more than ever, It’s vitally important to create and maintain design studios, green rooms and workrooms that turn apprehension into appreciation, and that ensure actors, colleagues and clients — everyone! — is seen and treated through a #humAncentered, #equalityfocused, #inclusivelySupporTiVe and #whollynonjudgmental and #bodypositive lens …

that embraces their bodies and themselves wholly — for who they are in whole.

IF YOU’RE READY TO MANIFEST CHANGE, I’M READY TO HELP YOU DO IT!

After many years of timid passivity (fearing the making of waves and how my disruption of the norm and public change of mission could potentially impact - or worse, burn valued and hard-earned professional bridges and personal relationships within my industry community) and continually solidifying every new project or client relationship using an approach that could be best described as one that '“colored within the lines” and followed exactly the typical industry protocols, I came to a decision and evaluation of conscience in the Fall of 2018… and simply olstopped. And I won’t lie — it was terrifying.

I came to my career in theatrical and fashion design and wardrobe curation/styling rather unexpectedly and very abstractly. It’s not even my singular career, either. In addition to my design work, I have maintained a near twenty-year full-time simultaneous career as the Head of Theatre and Performance Studies at a small Arts/Technology focused school for quirky yet brilliant kids in grades 6-12 with a melting pot of learning styles and diagnoses. My work in the field of design was not a linear progression, nor was it something I could have ever anticipated or predicted.

My work in Theatrical and Fashion manifested as a result of, and thanks to my own personal experiences interacting with Designers as a working actor, and from my professional work as a card-carrying, fully licensed and accredited theatre education practitioner (a life-long and inherited passion of mine, the result of having two incredibly brilliant, creative and forward-thinking, #ExclusivelyInclusive Arts, English and Humanities-based Special Education paramounts as parents) and made further professionally possible through my incredible fortune of studying at and receiving (with Honors) a degree in Drama, Applied Theatre, and Education from London’s Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. Applied Theatre, plainly put, is the social justice/globally and culturally minded - all inclusive arm of the theatre industry. Those working in the field are actively focused on creating, producing or participating in projects or work that are centered around utilizing drama, theatre and performance as methods of empowerment: raising and building the voices of those marginalized, granting agency, and increasing the representation and making visible communities or groups comprised of those under-served, undervalued and generally overlooked by general society.

“..Sooo…. While teaching full-time, you also decided to actually work…. successfully(??!!!)... as a… professional Costume and Fashion Designer/Stylist??…. How??…Why….?? HUH?!!! I AM SO CONFUSED?!?!?…!!!” is the question most often and understandably asked of me.

My answer now follows: I came to this work through the true absolute honor of meeting and earning the trust of the grandmother of one of my former students. She was a brilliant woman who came from nothing, but was built of what I can only describe as a superhuman resilience, fortitude and determination. Born far ahead of her time this woman was the epitome of a Golden Grand Dame — a person so intellectually and compassionately naturally brilliant in her own right and determined to extend her knowledge and understanding towards corporate business — at a time in America when Women were supposed to fully subscribe to their role as Wives/Homemakers — “be seen and not heard” ( and most certainly were expected to become Mute if they happened to be standing, sitting or otherwise positioned within 150+ miles, in any direction, from any tall city building that was known to house a very expensive oak-paneled Executive Office Suite used and populated solely by the members of a highly-respected, Caucasian male-only Corporate Board of Directors.

After being brought into the world in very rural Kansas during the Great Depression of the 1920s, and her formative majority experiences being those of one of a pair of twins, with little to no access to education opportunity or societal culture or experience — let alone the finishing schools and exclusive Ivy league female-only colleges that were accessible to others of her gender across the country who were far more fortunate than she ( and yet would encounter en masse later in life) Buddy (as she became known) found and married the love of her life and considered herself the most fortunate of any of her contemporaries for that. After many years of sacrifice and hard work and deserved success, suddenly Buddy found herself to be the wife of the very successful and accomplished President of a historic, high-profile, widely renowned Boston-based but nationally respected highly held financial company. The life of a wealthy socialite “social-wife” is one that was (and still is) highly scheduled, highly judged, and came with endless invitations. Cocktail parties, Galas, Balls, Dinners, Lunches, Brunches and Drinks Parties — there was rarely a day, afternoon or evening when attendance at a high profile event where Perfection was not only the norm, it was social and career suicide to appear “less than”. Failing to fulfill the stereotype of“Perfect Wife” and “Happy Couple” not only meant social isolation and abject mockery for the unfortunate Woman of the House, but also held profound and real risk to her husband’s reputation and entire professional career security.

“very early on,i think she realized that while he had fallen in love with her, with these parties and fancy schmancy social “blitzes” she was now expected to “be somebody” — not just somebody, but the better version of a peer to the rest of these women —Who had had all of this social grooming and had been raised to be a rich man’s wife. and she hadn’t been. and she never thought she would be. But now she was, and she wasn’t going to let them win or even let them know they might….She’d always loved clothes and the idea of fashion and standing out— probably from being a twin. Growing up as she did, they did…she and her sister were always making their own clothes and altering each others’ hand-me-downs to make them their own — it was their little escape into fantasy but also their armor from the grim and painful reality… [so how she handled the pressure later on]… she capitalized on what she knew and what she knew she could trust, and had always believed in: her armor.”

Click here to download the original forms in fully formatted PDF version!

A CUSTOMIZABLE/TEMPLATE VERSION OF THE #BodyPositive Measurement Guide/Forms is FREE TO ACCESS below! Please use them as they are intended.

Note: Any alterations to these forms that [re-] enforces and/or encourages, allies and/or condones in spirit or directive or action, the harassment, bullying and/or discrimination against any person in regards to their gender, race, body type or shape, personal being, sexual orientation, physical or mental dis/ability, or any other additional factors qualifying/constituting a violation of their human rights for fair and equal treatment is strictly prohibited. Violators will be face serious penalties for the mishandling and misrepresentation of these materials and the intent of the original author (Jake Egan O’Hara, 2020).