Dylanger Rose

The Book

Several years ago, I had the idea of starting a purity ministry. I began by sending a few tweets (@PurityEP) to find my voice. For some reason or another, the tweets diminished and I focused on other things. I don’t think it was the right time. A few years later, the idea came back to me but progress was slow because I didn’t know exactly how I wanted to approach it. Then on New Year’s Eve 2019, I scrolled to a video on IGTV of a girl talking about the games men play, relationships, and stories of dealing with fake friends. She had an entertaining demeanor and relatable commentary. A smart girl with her head on straight who kept herself together. A girl I would probably know from my neighborhood who was just tired of the BS. She was giving advice but from the perspective of her human experience, as most of us do. We chat with our friends and give each other advice but I’ve learned that unless our advice comes from the word of God, it is misinformation that will lead us down the wrong road. I gained helpful insight from her about what goes on in the world but all too often, as I said with girl chat, it’s the blind leading the blind. After watching her videos, ideas for topics I wanted to address started to flow. With what I had going on in my own life, things happening in the world, and my community; I knew that as I researched, gaining the knowledge was only going to help me if it stopped there. It wasn’t going to help anyone else or the people I have to deal with relationally unless they also have the same knowledge. The list of topics eventually became an outline for a book. Then the pandemic hit and I had more than enough time to write it. It was all coming together.

Marketing, Design & Sample Making

I wanted the book to connect in some way to my clothing company so my line could be about something more than cute clothes. Once I decided that the book was going to be written in an educational format, BAM! The name for it came to me. My clothing line is called High Level Apparel Co. so the name of the book became High School. I divided the topics under four subject headings like the amount of years you spend in actual High School. Freshman year is about singleness, Sophomore year is about finding a mate and courtship, Junior year is about marriage and Senior Year is about parenting. After the book was written, I had the idea of adding a Children’s book to the project to assist readers in their Senior year. The characters in the story have graduated High School and entered college, I titled it A Higher Education. 

I thought about who I was in High School. I was never the cheerleader, like the character in the story book, but I danced our halftime shows and Pep Rallies as the co-captain of our schools’ dance squad and a member of my family’s drill team. I was an equal dose of girly girl and tomboy as a future fashion major and sports athlete. I wouldn’t call myself artsy but I was always creative. I wanted to combine those thoughts for the theme of the entire project. This was me adding my flavor to a Christian assignment for God. I wanted the art for the book cover to look like a letterman jacket. The color skeme for the collection as well as the rest of the art, are my HLA logo colors, which happen to be the same as the University of Iowa but I went to Iowa State University. I had to add red so I wouldn’t look like a trader. 

My design process for this project was different than how I traditionally design. Usually, after a theme is decided, I gather images to create a mood board or go inspiration shopping, then create the CADs and source fabric and trim. But this time, I went to the fabric stores and let the fabric determine the design. As I searched through the isles of fabric, I asked myself, “What would my HLA girl wear to a Pep Rally? Would she also be going to other school-related events such as a dance, gym class, does she wear a uniform?” I found an awesome boho/tribal metallic fabric with ISU red in the pattern. I knew I wanted to work with mesh and the grey wool I saw from my last fabric run, so they were already in the cart. Later, I found a roll of metallic denim in the same ISU red. For trims, I knew I couldn’t go wrong with studs. I put studs on everything. I also selected trim from the upholstery section to match with the grey wool. I don’t usually like working with unconventional materials. In school, I would see people make collections out of soda cans and things found in the garbage. Artistic but not really for actual use. My design style is never overly abstract but what would a Pep Rally be without some pom poms? Once you have all the materials, you have to take square pieces of fabric and shape them on a form to create something wearable.

Trailer Production

So, nowadays, people make trailers for books as they would movies. Since your girl has production experience, this was right up my alley. I have a big imagination. Usually, my ideas are over the top in comparison to the budget or timeframe. I’ve been told to reel it in more than a few times. I knew going into the project that I needed to keep it simple so I wouldn’t overwhelm or stress myself out. I came up with a video treatment, choreography, created call sheets, release forms, got my old drill team on board and found a videographer to film it, and made my selects in editing. But the story behind the music and how it relates to the project, you might find interesting. Music is often the source of my inspiration. I got the name for High Level Apparel sitting at my desk listening to a Beyonce song. I was working at Rocawear at the time, so listening to anything with Jay-Z in it made you look like you were doing too much. The song was Upgrade U. Each verse was about how they could upgrade each other but there was something about when Jay-Z said, “this is high level, not eye level” that sparked my think tank. I wasn’t a college student anymore, I was a professional woman and my tastes were maturing. I knew that when I started my own line that I wanted it to be quality. An upgrade from the cheap things I could afford to buy at the time. Built to last like the things I would steal from my mother’s closet from back in her fashionista days. He also mentioned courtship, “Its big ballin’ baby, when I’m courting you”, which made it perfect for the trailer. The song was a prelude to the nuptials to follow. The couple got married the day after my birthday. The small team that I worked with at the company always made sure to do a little something for each person’s b-day. Near the end of the workday, we had a potluck. I remember my co-worker Lanette making some bomb homemade baked Mac n’ Cheese and Sweet Potatoes. It was the first time I had sweet potatoes with cinnamon sticks and raisins. In the mid-west, we eat them with marshmallows. I haven’t ate them the old way ever since. Mike, our denim designer, ordered his favorite oxtails from a spot on the corner of 34th/9th. Jay-Z’s sister Michelle stopped by to speak with her cousin Lanette. She said a quick hello to everyone and happy b-day before pulling her into the hallway to whisper a few words. People are nosy, so they always want to know what you’re talking about. But we didn’t think much of the convo until the next day when everyone who was related to Jay-Z at the company was missing from the office. We later discovered, a little before the rest of the world got wind of the news, that a secret wedding took place.  

I learned some things to take into my next fashion show 🙂