Sarahbeth Larrimore
Dressmaker & Teacher
Tell us a little bit about yourself! When did you start Unabashed apparel?
I realized in the middle of my liberal arts university education that I really just wanted to make glorious clothes that inspired and encouraged women to be themselves -so I started sewing, designing and creating for that future.
I graduated and started down the road of becoming an independent designer. It's been a long winding road. I was 23 when I truly started Unabashed Apparel. After a decade I took a couple years off and just did some bespoke work, but never stopped sewing and creating. Then I reentered the public arena by teaching which feels like what I was meant to do all along.
I'm passionate about sustainable fibers in design, which really means linen, silk, cotton and wool. Those that we grow and tend and that can be composted back to the earth but I'm most passionate about women really stepping into their self worth and creating the things that they always wanted to wear. Unabashed Apparel - the name still fits after all these years, it's what I wish for women everywhere.
What are you most passionate about?
Inspiring women to live their most juicy artistic bodacious lives right now, bedecked in clothes that celebrate the whole of them.
Where do you gather inspiration from?
I was born and raised in the piedmont of North Carolina and grew up around the historic village of Old Salem. There I learned at a really young age about life as it would have been in a small crafts-town in the 1700s. I learned about digging clay to turn into pots, and about growing flax to spin, weave, & dye into shirts and trousers etc. I learned about how -but I also learned about a certain panache from the history of the craftsfolk that inhabited the town. There's something to caring about how you do something and putting your spin on it. The maker's way or the artist's flick of the wrist. I think I've always had a longing for that. Things that are useful, but have a bit of something else too - the spark of magic of the maker. We all have our own call or sigil don't we?
I'm inspired by old simple utilitarian things that have that extra something to them.
If you could invite any three people to your dream dinner party who would they be?
Honestly? Not anyone famous, just folks that have passed on that I dearly miss. I'm never going to stop missing the way my Sapphire's voice (my gran) called me dearheart.
What advice would you give to your younger self?
You're on the right path. Your heartbreak & fumbling is necessary to the journey & oh my god sweetcheeks, life never looks how you think it's going to look, but if you give it a chance, it'll be even better.
What quote or saying do you try to live by?
‘Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.’ ~Lao Tzu
Which is good, because I'm a slow maker.
