Today we’d like to introduce you to Maxine Trowbridge.
Hi Maxine, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstories with our readers.
It’s a full-circle journey! I started my career in fashion design back in London in the 90s, after I graduated from the London College of Fashion. I worked as a junior designer for an established British fashion house, Mansfield, that sadly no longer exists, known for its luxury style and British-made quality and dressing members of the Royal Family. I designed everything from separates to print design, guipures, and embroidery; it was short-lived but packed with great experiences.
In the mid-90s, I moved to the USA, specifically Palm Beach, Florida, which killed my designing career in one flight for obvious reasons — Palm Beach was not a fashion design location! I dabbled in retail until I turned my career towards the media industry, working for luxury lifestyle publications, such as Ocean Drive Magazine in Miami, and later contributing to Du Jour Magazine in New York.
In 2007, I founded a digital business, an online fashion and shopping magazine, and a blog network known as PinkMemo, with editions in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Dallas — an early era for blogs, digital advertising and social media marketing, I garnered incredible knowledge and experience during this time, from technical details with a custom-built platform to email marketing, SEO, digital advertising and social media marketing. However, timing is everything for a small business, and by 2013, I realized it was too late to diversify from just online advertising. I closed the business, missing the influencer wave that would soon take over. We learn from our mistakes, and as one project fails, another will blossom; I returned to print publication and took the helm as editor-in-chief at PaperCity Magazine Dallas.
After that, I departed magazine life to focus on a new chapter. I volunteered as board president at Dallas Contemporary, where I’ve been a board member for over ten years. Shortly after my two-year term as president, I co-founded an art business, Artrinity, with my partners Joyce Goss and Kenny Goss. Artrinity cultivates art-focused projects featuring emerging and mid-career contemporary artists.
From art back to fashion — in February 2020, I returned to my fashion career. I founded Eve & Max with an ethos to reimagine the lifecycle of fashion and embark on a journey towards a sustainable business. Eve & Max is a conscious women’s ready-to-wear collection designed with the belief that style should be ethical, beautiful, and artful. Existing at the intersection of contemporary art and fashion, Eve & Max features artistic collaborations as part of every collection’s inherent legacy.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Life is never a smooth road, it’s always filled with bumps along the journey, but the challenges are always about how you deal with setbacks and keep driving forward. Moving from London to Palm Beach was difficult, settling into a new culture, redefining yourself from a career aspect, and being an ex-pat experiencing a new environment. An English-speaking immigrant is still an immigrant, and culturally England and the USA are very different, and it took a couple of years to adjust to life in Florida. Just a road bump!
We cannot learn in life without failure. Losing my digital business, PinkMemo, was extremely painful. Still, I overcame the enormous sense of loss and continued working with the same purpose and work ethic to pursue happiness and fulfilment in my daily contributions in life.
Even today, with the launch of Eve & Max, challenges are presented consistently, such as launching a new business at the beginning of 2020, unknowing that a global pandemic was just around the corner. During these last two years, I’ve experienced many setbacks, yet many blessings, but you learn to focus on positive, actionable steps forward. Since Eve & Max is a direct-to-consumer focused business hosting trunk shows in cities across the country, the pandemic certainly slowed that growth plan, so it’s been more difficult than I planned. But in hindsight, this is also a good thing allowing plans to be more strategic and well-considered during this time of uncertainty. 2023 is going to be a great year!
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
As founder and co-creative director, I recently launched Eve & Max, a women’s luxury ready-to-wear collection available online and through private shopping events. Eve & Max is beginning a new journey, culminating all my skills, experiences, and passion, all rolled into one. From designing, creating a product, selling, marketing, spending time with clients, and managing the day-to-day nuances of a new business, while working with Samudra Hartanto (co-creative) and team — I enjoy every aspect. I don’t work; I live my best life, at least that is the aim, to make money doing what I love.
It’s hard for any brand to say why they’re different in a crowded fashion marketplace. However, Eve & Max focuses on a conscious ethos to reimagine the lifecycle of fashion and embark on a journey towards a sustainable and socially conscious business. Our goal is to empower the client to disrupt the traditional shopping cycle and take a holistic approach to luxury fashion, sustainable style and wardrobe planning. In essence, with only one seasonless collection a year, our approach is to build a business model that slows down over-consumption. With our focus on pre-orders, let’s think about how we can curate our wardrobe and buy styles that we order, which will last, selecting quality over quantity, and purchasing with purpose and not instant gratification.
With clients ordering their clothes, it gives a better ability to plan and budget how much to order, so we don’t create waste, and the concept is never to go on sale. If a brand is on sale, they produce too much product over demand, creating waste. If consumers care about their consumption and productively support the environment, they can also think about changing their shopping agenda.
For a sense of freshness in each collection, we offer limited-edition print pieces designed cohesively with contemporary artists, which reinforces our belief that fashion is a work of living art and fashion expression. Shopping for styles should be thoughtfully curated and acquired like a life-long art collection. Eve & Max is not about trends; it’s not about immediacy; it’s about conscious consideration.
Lastly, and most importantly, clients ask, “Who is Eve?” which is a great question! Eve is our muse; Eve acknowledges and celebrates women; Eve is nurturing and caring, a conscious-minded inspiration that keeps the business ethos on track. Simply that Eve cares.
How do you think about happiness?
It’s important to be proud and happy of your best life, be a good person, love and support your family and friends, and give back to the community and the planet. Let’s be happy about the intangible moments.
Happiness is a daily ritual of gratitude that comes from a sense of comfort and well-being, not earned or rewarded; happiness is a mental state of self-appreciation and love for all.
But I love a good design session with my design partner Samudra Hartanto, who is based in Paris. We’ve known each other since college, so Samudra has known me since I was a young woman starting my fashion career, and not many people in my life know me this way. We can talk about fashion all day long, but it’s a very different conversation from a design point of view, not from styling or shopping; it’s a pure conversation on design. Creativity makes me happy.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.eveandmax.com
- Instagram: @eve_and_max
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eveandmax2020
Image Credits
Misael Rodriguez
Nick Glover
