LFWSS25 - BIRTH ORDER: By Juliaah presents Psychology in Fashion
Founded by Julia Henrickson in 2023, By Juliaah is an Oslo-based fashion brand set to teach us all a masterclass in the art of revolutionary design and social psychology this fashion season. Taking inspiration from ‘The Birth Order Theory’, Henrickson’s collection presents one of the most captivating conceptualisations of the abstract yet to be seen by this author.
The Birth Order Theory, as proposed by Austrian psychotherapist Alfred Adler in the 20th Century, suggests that your personality and development is dictated by the position of seniority amongst your siblings. Whilst considered controversial to some, Julia has stated that the theory has been of great use in her personal life. Employing and dissecting silhouette, colour, material, and movement, Julia has defied the bounds of fashion design to weave something as refreshingly novel as psychological theory into the canvas that is her SS25 collection.
Having cultivated such technical skill and a seasoned theoretical approach to her work over the span of a few short years, it's hard not to envy Julia’s talent and output. Read on to discover how she achieved such a feat.
HOLLY: For the readers, could you explain a bit more about how you came into the world of fashion? Where did the brand start?
JULIA: Oh! Well, I haven’t really prepared an answer or anything-
HOLLY: No worries!
JULIA: But I’ve been into fashion ever since I was a little girl, so I’ve always worked towards becoming a fashion designer. Every choice I’ve made throughout my teenage years has been directing towards this path. And I started working from a very young age in order to get enough money to do the things that I wanted to do, so, yeah, no, I’ve always wanted to be a fashion designer. Throughout the years I think I have understood that my passion is just creating. It doesn’t necessarily have to be fashion I don’t think, but, it happens to be fashion right now. And I love fashion, but, I think it’s just the art of creating that inspires me and keeps me going.
HOLLY: Okay! Thank you. Then, I suppose my second question is which child are you? I’m just fascinated by this whole idea of social psychology and fashion. I need to know more!
JULIA: Ah! Have you read my concepts?
HOLLY: Yeah! I read each of the instagram posts and this is just…this is an idea that I’ve never, you know, I’ve never come across this before. Where did that come from?
JULIA: Ah, well, thank you first of all for taking the time to read that. So, basically, this collection was made for my last year of fashion school, so we had a year to develop the whole collection and when I was deciding what I wanted my collection to be inspired by, what the concept was going to be, I knew that it had to be something that was meaningful to me, and I’ve always been very fascinated by this theory called ‘The Birth Order’ Theory, that tells us, basically, what position you’re born into your family can have a huge impact on your personality for the rest of your life. So, I categorised my collection to first born, middle child, and last born, and then only child. And, I’ve grown up as an only child, even though I have several step-siblings and half- siblings, but I’ve been raised as an only child. Basically, it was just more of like a social experiment for me. Throughout the process, I interviewed people to see if there was some truth to the theory and also, just because, it has helped me understand the people around me more, like why certain people might crave more attention, why some people thrive in leadership roles. I just wanted to share that knowledge with people because it has helped me understand the people all around me much more.
HOLLY: Wow, yeah, that’s very interesting! And then in terms of- I saw some information about the choice of fabric with respect to these personality traits, I mean the faux-snake skin was very, very cool. I was wondering if you could expand a bit more about fabric choice, but also, colour as so much of the collection was so bright red and black, but my favourite, was the two-toned silk like how it was purple and green (as the fabric moved). So, I was wondering if you could expand a little bit more about fabric choice and colour choice?
JULIA: Ooo, well I could talk about this all day but I’ll try to keep it short! Basically, it was a bit difficult to get this psychological concept through visually, that was something that I struggled the most with, like, how am I going to represent each category best, visually, for other people so that they understand this. So, my teachers were very, very on me about, like, ‘you have to- this has to be visible for people’. So, if you know a little bit about the theory you know that the first-born tends to be more responsible, and the middle-child is more rebellious, the last-born is more childish, like the child of the family. Then what I did was, I chose fabrics that I thought represented each of those keywords: for the first-born, I went for black wool, because that reminded me of like a tailored suit jacket, often seen in leadership roles; then I thought to myself, “What is the opposite of that?”, and, to me, that was red leather, faux leather, and also symbolises more rebelliousness, I think; and then, for the last-born, I went for something that was a bit more childish and light and a bit easier to shape, which turned out to be this raw silk, and, to be honest, I just ended up choosing the blue silk just because I really liked it, and then, the one that’s like, as you described it ‘purple and green’, it’s more like red and blue, I would say, in real life like close-up, I would say that was more just to tie the whole collection together. And then, for the only-child, one of the keywords I would use to describe an only-child is the centre of attention, so I just tried to find the most crazy, “out there”, fabric that I could find, which ended up being the black snake-skin. So, that’s really how that all came together.
HOLLY: Cool! Are there any particular materials that you are looking to experiment more with in future collections? Having come across this many materials in this collection, have you found something else that you have been inspired by and want to work with?
JULIA: I think one of the things about me as a designer is that I want to use materials in an unexpected way. I definitely had a vision in my head, like, you know the red look, the red faux-leather, bright red one, I was explaining that one actually to my classmates and my teachers and I was actually recommended not to sew it in red so I was struggling with people not understanding my vision. And I just decided to go ahead and do it anyways. And it ended up being one of the most eye-catching pieces, the one that people love the most. So just implementing different fabrics in unexpected ways and giving it new life is definitely something that I want to continue to focus on as a designer and not follow the rules that have been before.
HOLLY: Yeah, like subverting expectation…
JULIA: Yeah, exactly! I’m not sure if it makes sense but yeah, exactly, you’ll definitely see me use some, probably, well-known fabrics in unconventional ways in the future, I think. Because I think that is fun! And it seems to have worked so far and I hope it will continue to work.
HOLLY: I also found your only-child look quite fun, where she threw the hood off to become… like a train… I don’t know how you would describe this but playing with the silhouette and the piece itself being fluid and having a certain “multiplicity”. Is this how you’re looking to make your mark in the Oslo/Norway fashion scene? Is this something we’ll see more of as a way that you are looking to experiment?
JULIA: So, all of my pieces are adjustable. That was something that was very important to me. If someone is going to purchase a piece from me for quite a high price, I think it’s nice to give the option to be able to style the piece how they want to. So all of my pieces have a lot of different styling options and I have always wanted to be able to show that on stage. However, it is a bit difficult because it can easily become a bit clumsy to do that. I already had my fashion show in Oslo which I styled some of the pieces one way and for this one I tried to style them a bit differently so that I could show some of the variation. And something that I wanted to do, with the hooded-thing, over-the-head, that was something that I wanted to do in the previous fashion show but it was a bit too difficult maybe for the models at the time. So I was so happy when the Fashion Scout team, they were so happy to try it and it worked out perfectly so I was very happy that we managed to do that on the runway now. And, yeah, no, I definitely want to create pieces which that have- I don’t know if the word is “multifunctional” but different styling options. That is important to me. And also I think it will contribute to sustainability in many ways because when you have one piece that can be styled many ways, the chances that someone will keep it longer is higher.
HOLLY: Yeah! I was literally just about to ask you about that. Is this part of your motivation? Because I feel like, so frequently, we see celebrities on red-carpets and they wear an outfit and because they’ve worn it that one time, they can only wear it in that event. And then that trickles down into the rest of society where people feel like, “Oh, I’ve worn that outfit in an instagram post so I can’t wear it to my next event”.
JULIA: Exactly, exactly, that is definitely part of the motivation and also, just practically, because a lot of my pieces- I’ll take, for example, my blue dress that opened the show - you know how it has like a collar around the head, that piece, you can actually detach it and put it around the waist so that you could put a coat on top. Just because, it wouldn’t be practical to wear a coat on top of the dress the way I presented it on the runway and also, the black coat, with the latex suit under it that had a long tail, that is also meant to be able to attach to up on the sides so that it’s not dragging on the floor, like let’s say, that wouldn’t be very practical if you were walking outside in the rain. It’s more so that you can have a dramatic effect, if you want to take pictures, if you’re inside but more so that you can actually wear the clothes from place to place.
HOLLY: That’s so much more innovative than I have come across in so many people’s collections. Just such a strong thought for practicality of wear…
JULIA: Thank you! Thank you!
HOLLY: And, also, I saw your accessories that you made from scrap pieces so I was just going to ask more about the concerns for the brand in terms of sustainability and renewable goals for the brand. Is it integral? Is it something that you want to explicitly make a goal for By Juliaah?
JULIA: Yes, well, I would absolutely love to! I was in a very experimental phase and also I am a very new designer so I don’t have many years of experience; I actually only have these three years and the past year was the first year that I actually got to do what I wanted to do that wasn’t just a school task. So, I don’t have that much history to refer back to but in the future I would love to find a way to create or give old scrap pieces new life. I started experimenting with the scraps that I had from this collection and tried to mould them into new accessories like bags and corsets. They’re not necessarily the most practical pieces but they’re very ‘artsy’, so, a lot of people like to take pictures with them, I’ve presented them at art exhibitions. It just depends on what you want to use them for. I wouldn’t necessarily buy fabric to make these pieces, but I think it’s a good way to use scraps that would go to waste anyways, to give them new life, basically.
HOLLY: I just think that it’s amazing that you’ve only been doing this for three years but you clearly have had so much thought around not just the pieces themselves but their longevity, not being wasteful. You’re ability to balance artistry and practicality is crazy!
JULIA: Ah, thank you so much! That really means a lot!
HOLLY: My last question; when you think of who is wearing your pieces, who do you see? What do they do? What are they interested in? What are they trying to promote in society? What else are they wearing it with and where to?
JULIA: This is probably one of the most difficult questions to answer because my answer is so vague but it’s basically, I would say, people that are willing to stand out a bit. But then I’ve also tried to have such a diverse collection that also people who don’t want to be seen can wear them as well. From the first-born to the only child, there is quite a range of silhouettes which could appeal to very different people. However, I do want to focus a bit more on statement pieces that are- that people will notice and want to take pictures of, to create a fashion moment. That’s probably where I’ll be heading as a designer but I think I want to implement the styling options to maybe make it less extravagant, for more practical reasons. But, if you’d asked me like 10 years ago, I’d definitely say I’d want to design for red-carpet, which still is something that I want to do, but I also think it's a bit silly to create looks for just one event. Norway doesn’t have that many designers yet. A lot of the brands that are already around have a more minimalist expression, so I think it would be fun to add more crazy, extravagant, red-carpet looks to the Norwegian/Scandinavian market. Not to say that there aren’t any! But, just that, I think it would be fun to add even more!
HOLLY: Amazing! Thank you so much!
Providing an undoubtedly refined regard for practicality of wear and a streamlined approach to sustainability, By Juliaah proves that you really can have it all in one collection. Without forgoing an inch of artistry or creativity, she has intricately balanced values of maximalist and minimalist design to create a collection imbued with real meaning and significance. I expect it won’t be long before she is considered one of the greats.
Written and edited by Holly Anderson
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