It’s not surprising that Susanna Moyer became a clothing designer. With a fashionable mother, who was a model and Miss Washington, DC, Susanna Moyer made clothes, houses, “…anything I could for my Barbies. I got a shoebox; they got a car.”
As a young student at the famed Parson’s School of Design, Susanna and her classmates were an elite group that included Mark Badgley and James Mischka, creators of the uber chic Badgley Mischka line, plus Calvin Klein was their class advisor.
“Today, I wouldn’t have a chance to meet somebody like Calvin Klein. He worked on the sketch with us, worked through the muslin and the fabric process. If the model didn’t show up, it would be ‘Hey, Susanna! Can you put on Jim Mischka’s outfit for Calvin?’ and Calvin Klein would pin my underwear to the muslin. It was amazing!”
“CLOTHES USED TO BE A STAPLE IN OUR LIVES, BUT NOW THEY’VE BECOME DISPOSABLE.”
More than anyone, it was Calvin Klein who influenced Susanna Moyer to follow her dreams. “He asked me what I wanted to do, and I said, I want to go to Paris. Calvin said, ‘If that’s what you really want, you need to go to Paris before you get the job, the apartment and the boyfriend. Once you invest all of that into NYC, you’re not going to go.’ I looked at him and said, ‘You’re right!’”
“Looking back, I was so naive. I got a Travel & Leisure magazine that listed every fashion house, their address, contact and bio of the designer. When I got to Paris, I made appointments to meet them all and ended up working with Madame de Mortemart at Christian Dior.”
From there, Susanna worked for French fashion designer, Ted Lapidus, and helped establish the Paris fashion program at Parsons, where she taught. After five years in Paris, Susanna returned to the U.S. and launched her own clothing line. Made from elegant, European fabrics, her clothes were pieces women could wear to work and then to cocktails. The line was carried by Neiman Marcus and 250 specialty stores, but after eight and a half years, marriage and a baby, “I couldn’t work like that anymore, plus everything about the business was changing and becoming more difficult.” Bravely, Susanna closed her line.
“It was devastating! I wondered who am I? What is my identity? I’m not a person anymore. I’m a clothing line.”
Like many women, Susanna reinvented herself. At Hickey Freeman she learned new facets of the clothing business and traveled to Italy every four to six weeks, then became VP of the Sigrid Olsen line at Liz Claiborne.
From designing imaginary worlds for her Barbie dolls, to being an integral part of the top department stores and fashion brands, Susanna Moyer has seen the fashion world upclose and personal. “Clothes used to be a staple in our lives, but now they’ve become disposable. People get tired of things much faster; they age out of things, or find something new online. The fashion industry has changed a lot.”
