“People living with disabilities want a dignified way of dressing and living life”

When did you decide to pursue fashion design as a career?

Credit: Werable

1/8

I decided that fashion design was something I wanted to do ever since I was eight.

I always remember telling my mom that this was something that I was very focused on and that designing clothes brought me a lot of joy. They took me seriously, and because I was still at a very young age, I think many people just assumed that I was going to change my mind.
But you kept to your guns.
Yeah, I did. I worked hard to develop my skillset over the years, and I really found my sense of fulfillment in fashion design as time went on.

What really solidified my decision was when I enrolled in the School of the Arts and found out that they didn’t have a fashion design program. I remember feeling very discouraged because I would say that I was a very mediocre student compared to my peers, so I didn't really see any possible pathway for me to excel. I spoke to my parents, knowing that it was a bit of a long shot, but I decided to apply to Central Saint Martins in London anyway.

I do remember that the interviewer was quite skeptical about accepting a 16-year-old into the school, so he gave me a slot in their foundational program and I also had to complete an ‘A’ Level module before I could confirm a spot. My parents were supportive, but they also sat me down to make sure that I was very sure about the path I was choosing. They were so helpful in grant applications, but they also made it a point to instill in me a sense of accountability towards my decision in joining this program.

Werable is really one of the few brands locally that aren’t just making fashion, but are creating clothes that cater to the differently-abled community. What led you to this path?

Credit: Rachel Elizabeth Goh

2/8

If I were to pinpoint it to a specific memory, it would be the very first adaptive fashion project that I started working on, when I took a class in college.

My teacher was also running a non-profit organisation called Open Style Lad, and she was such an incredible woman because she ran programs that brought together fashion design students with engineering students and those training to be occupational therapists. And in our groups of three, she’d give us written bios of clients without us ever meeting these people. These bios would list the kind of disabilities that they had, and would also give us an introduction to their personalities.

Without ever meeting her in the selection process, I was paired with a 27-year-old woman named Christina, who suffered from Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) syndrome. Her challenge statement to us was very clear: she still needs to leave her house even in the winter to work, and she wanted a coat that she could put on by herself.

It started out as this seemingly innocent school project, but on the day of the presentation, I was sharing about how Christina had mentioned that there were so many simple things she wanted to do – like wearing a coat on her own – but couldn’t. When I said that, I remember looking at Christina in the audience and it dawned on me that these things meant a lot to her. It really affected me and my purpose in life.

Sometimes I think that what I’m doing feels so frivolous. As compared to a medical student who will go on to become a doctor that will change lives, why would anyone care about a fashion design student?

Then again, I realized that I wasn’t being fair to myself because who said designing clothes for people like Christina can’t be life-changing? To them, being able to wear a coat on their own is life-changing.

As an able-bodied designer, how do you go about designing these pieces, and are there any challenges that stand out in the designing process?

Credit: Rachel Elizabeth Goh

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That’s an interesting question. I never really thought of myself as separate from the community, because my friends in the differently-abled community who are living with disabilities know what it’s like to be excluded from something and so when they are approached to share these experiences with Werable, they have been very inclusive towards me. Empathy is universal.

I’m also very open with them, and a lot of times when I start a new project or go about researching and testing products, I’m going into the process with questions, not answers. In doing so, I’m open to them teaching me about how to better design for them, and that’s why I love this process of designing clothes so much. There is a lot of joy and peace that stems from the learning process.

I usually start with a very simple challenge, and these can often be quite emotional. It can be a simple action statement like “I want to be able to wear pants and zip my fly by myself”. Or “I want to be able to avoid having difficult conversations about my disability”. These are very human conversations that affect the way the clothing turns out.

Even with our recent collaboration with Singaporean paralympic swimmer Yip Pin Xiu, she talked about how zippers can be very difficult to wear. It’s also very interesting because she brought up how she wants to be able to wear dresses on dates. Each time she does so, she comes home to find that her mother has waited up for her because she needs her mum’s help to unzip the dress.

That struck a chord with me because it’s such a relatable and moving approach to seeing how fashion can impact someone’s life.

In designing for Werable, I am thankful that the differently-community has invited me into this experience. While this isn’t so much of a challenge, I also have to be mindful that not all disabilities look the same and my designs need to be able to cater to these differences.

A good example is when I collaborated with the Stroke Support Station, and I got to meet with stroke survivors who have recently had a stroke and those who had one a decade ago.

Those who had their stroke ten years ago will have different needs, because they will say “I can button my shirt with one hand, I can do most things by myself unaided”, and this affects how I design as every customer has different challenges. I learn a little bit more every day, and every time I speak to them.

For those who are interested, how does Werable operate? Is there ready-to-wear, or is everything made-to-measure?

Credit: Rachel Elizabeth Goh

4/8

I’d say that it’s a hybrid of both right now. We have pre-existing designs that people can purchase, but we also do have pre-orders. When we get an order placed, we will reach out to the customer to inquire more about their disability – such as which side it affects – and we can tweak our designs accordingly. We want to be mindful of their available range of motion because there’s no surefire way of determining this. A lot of the time, it involves a conversation during the fitting, and I’ll bring along a sample garment so we can see what needs alterations or supplementary changes.

I believe that what sets Werable apart is that the clothing isn’t just adapted to your ability needs, but that we also approach it with a strong fashion narrative to introduce these adaptive functions.

Are there standout moments that makes you feel proud of your work?

Credit: Rachel Elizabeth Goh

5/8

Recently we worked on a pair of pants for a gentleman who survived a stroke and couldn’t bend down as a result. In our consultation, he mentioned that when he goes to the toilet, there is a tendency for him to drop his pants on the floor, which makes it difficult for him to pull them up and leaves him stuck.

Through that chat, we realised that being able to go to the bathroom by oneself is something you don’t want to compromise. Everyone wants to have the dignity of being able to use the bathroom unassisted. We worked on a pants design that had a cute suspender style and relocated his pockets onto the side of the body where he had full mobility. We also used magnetic fasteners that could be operated with one hand.

In trying on the pants, you could see how happy he was. So when we asked him for a photo, he put his hand on his hip, struck a pose, and flashed a cheeky smile. It’s these little moments that make it all worthwhile for me. It brings me so much joy and reminds me that my clients are forming a real emotional bond with my clothing.

Tell us more about your collaboration with Yip Pin Xiu, and how you went about designing it.

Credit: Rachel Elizabeth Goh

6/8

My design process for this collection was really going back to what a person values in one’s life. So in sifting through past interviews that she did, we came across an instance where she mentioned that it’s only when she’s in water that she can move freely. I instantly saw that water had the potential to be a motif for my design inspiration, and I could center it in my process because water has enabled her to build her entire career whilst offering her so much freedom to move.

As a designer, I never like forcing my own personal aesthetic in for the sake of calling it my own. So I actually very much enjoyed this collaboration, because this was the first time I was able to find some genuine connection between the emotional, the creative, and the practical aspects.

One of the things we did with this collection was to do some research on historical examples of adaptive fashion, and we found that wheelchair users in the past would often wear separates because they would not bunch up as dresses would.

We also discovered that 17th-century clothing had vents cut into the coats and tops to address this bunching problem when its wearer sat down, so we looked at creating vents in a way that was hidden and seamless by fashioning it to look like waves.

I try to be as seamless as possible. I want to create elegant solutions for elegant people.

Is it difficult staying this innovative?

Credit: Werable

7/8

I don’t think so, because I’m welcome all forms of disabilities. I’m believe I am careful with the challenge statements that I am tackling. I am trying to keep things big picture enough so there’s room for me to explore, and at the same time, it’s feasible enough to scale and impact as many people as possible.

My hope is that in the future, we are able to go beyond our direct-to-consumer model and work on more B2B projects. I think back to the project that my professor gave us, and how all my peers came up with amazing products yet none of them were actually scaling it.

So my big goal to tackle was to find a way to move beyond product inception and look at scaling. For example, it would be an ideal goal for us to work with a hospital in some licensing model. They have a different kind of need that isn’t necessarily fashion-centric. I’d love to embark on a project like this so it also pushes my team and my know-how so we can also use these lessons to make Werable’s adaptive fashions more affordable for people.

One comment we sometimes hear is really why Werable is paying attention to clothing people with disabilities. To these commentators, they think of persons with disabilities as having nowhere to go anyway, so why focus an entire brand on creating a full wardrobe of fashion solutions? And I think that changing that mindset is something I want to be able to do with Werable in the long run.

We are trying to establish adaptive fashion as a norm in Singapore, much like sustainable fashion or plus-sized fashion. People living with disabilities want a dignified way of dressing and living life, and do care about how they look on the outside. So if we are able to move towards fulfilling this goal of social impact on top of scaling our operations, that would be my absolute dream.

To learn more about Werable, visit https://www.werable.co/