"Casual meets cool" in Allstolen fashion line

One can only speculate as to what Elizabeth Worgan ’16 would be doing today had she not seen, at age 6, The Phantom Menace, the fourth film in the Star Wars saga.

She was so impressed by Queen Amidala’s royal wardrobe that she decided then and there to devote her life to fashion. Which goes a long way toward explaining how in 2014 Worgan launched a clothing company, AllStolen Apparel, featuring a Star Wars theme mixed with punk, hip hop, and biker culture.

As second-place finishers in Skidmore’s 2015 Kenneth A. Freirich Business Plan Competition, Worgan and David Florence ’16 won a $10,000 cash prize last April. They’ve used it to establish a compelling e-commerce website to launch their product line with three basic items: a baseball tee-shirt, a sweatshirt, and a tank top. Soon to come are hats, socks, underwear, and more tees.

AllStolen will present its product line this Thursday, Dec. 10, in Dystopia: The 2015 Element Fashion Show, a biannual showcase for Skidmore fashion designers, starting at 7:30 p.m. at the Tang Museum. Tickets are free but must be reserved in advance at the Case Center Information Desk.

Early in their strategizing, Worgan and Florence surveyed Skidmore students on clothing needs and preferences. Their key discovery: The lives of American college students today are so hectic and fast-paced that they have time only for low-maintenance clothes they can just throw on. Yet they still want to look stylish and fashionable.

So the solution, Worgan and Florence reasoned, is comfortable and stylish streetwear—the “meeting place of casual and cool,” they call it. 

“AllStolen’s line is for people who want to be comfortable but don’t want to sacrifice fashion,” says Worgan. “They can wear tight-fitting sweatpants with a T-shirt, but the designs are so great and the angles of the silhouettes so sharp they almost look luxurious.”

Both accomplished musicians, Worgan (guitar) and Florence (jazz saxophone) are keenly attuned to the influence of music on youth culture. “You can’t pull from punk or rock and roll,” Worgan says, “without taking into account the way you dress.”

The same can be said for biker culture, which Florence brings to the AllStolen aesthetic, being a biker himself. 

“People who wear our clothes are not 9 to 5 people,” he notes. “They’re the people who get out and do what they want, and they go get it. That’s what the motorcycle symbolizes—ultimate freedom from everything.”

“And it just looks really cool, too,” he laughs. 

The latest Star Wars movie will be Dec. 18, and Worgan is preparing accordingly. She’s not divulging the exact nature of the tie-in, but she promises, “It’s going to be good.”