Forget Athleisure! This Line Lends a Feminine Take on Glamleisure
Forget Athleisure! This Line Lends a Feminine Take on Glamleisure
Before you load up on tight and bright leggings, be advised: Forget athleisure. If the Fall shows (notably Kim Jones’s finale at Louis Vuitton) have shown us anything, it’s that sporty clothes are getting a more serious, glamorous spin this go-round. It’s a moment that belongs to high fashion meeting yoga mats, fast-and-easy athleticism meeting street-smart elegance, and ultimately, it speaks to how people want to live their day-to-day lives: That is, in an elevated state of ease.
Longtime publicist and Live the Process founder Robyn Berkley is no stranger to fashion and its increasingly casual dress codes. “From underpinnings and bra tops at Dior and sneakers at Balenciaga and Louis Vuitton to actual leggings at Céline, luxury brands are adding elements of activewear to their collections and giving them an aspirational-design sensibility,” Berkley says. “People have embraced that culture, and that’s really exciting to see.” In addition to being an athletic enthusiast herself, Berkley is best known in the fashion community for an extensive background in PR with a wide-ranging roster of clients. But after working for LaForce & Stevens, J.Lindeberg, and People’s Revolution (where she spent seven years as Kelly Cutrone’s right-hand woman, working on accounts like Jeremy Scott, Agent Provocateur, and Longchamp, among many others), followed by what she calls a “self-care trip” to Bali, Indonesia, (where she was certified in Vinyasa Flow yoga), she was ready to break out for a solo stint.
“I became obsessed with feeling good, and so I took some time to focus 100 percent on myself and what I wanted my next move to be,” she says. “I knew I wanted a career in the wellness and lifestyle space, but how would that look and what would it be?” In 2011, following her return to the States where she founded a namesake PR brand, RBBR, Berkley thought long and hard about what was missing from her world—mainly “thoughtful and feminine clothes that I could practice in and wear out after”—and took inspiration from years of dancing and gymnastics to launch (with the help of my co-founder Jared Vere) Live the Process, her line of wellness ready-to-wear that’s at once approachable, meditative, and beautiful.
The clothes themselves are an impressive array of athletically cut (and elegantly cut-out) high-performance knitwear and entirely layerable workout-inspired pieces that make for a wardrobe to get sweaty in or, just as easily, well . . . not. The Fall collection, now available on Moda Operandi, which was inspired by off-duty ballerinas and realized in new neutrals like mustard and navy peony, summons the same kind of all-encompassing love you’d have for, say, your Loewe Hammock bag or Céline Cabas tote. It also has the same soft-yet-strong sensibility of your favorite high-fashion labels to back it up: There are ribbed sweaters spliced and finished with ties that are a far cry from athleisure, knit crop polos and kick-flare trousers that transcend trends, deliberately loose jersey tops and hoodies almost too good to be reserved for the gym, and snug high-waisted suspender leotards and form-fitting jumpsuits with four-way stretch and moisture-wicking that move with the body. And it’s all machine washable!
What the collection is after—and what it delivers with its thoughtful accents designed for women with well-versed lives (those waist-and-thigh-whittling seams! Those easily scrunched-up ribbed sleeves with thumbholes!)—is that age-old Holy Grail: Clothes that can take you seamlessly from point A to point B in style.
