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GREENSBORO - It's just days before her first solo fashion show, and Kelly Cox is uncharacteristically calm.

Her handpicked models are runway ready, and her pieces need just a few alterations. This is extremely unusual for the 24-year-old fashion designer.

"I'm really an anxious person, usually," Cox says.
Her line of "upcycled" clothing, "Nouveau," will be featured in a fashion show Saturday at Design Archives. In the fashion world, "upcycled" means that a designer takes outdated, worn or discarded apparel and transforms it into something wearable and more modern.

In Cox's hands, an entire line of clothing has been revived. What was once relinquished by others - an old quilt, worn pillowcases, outdated men's dress shirts - are now modern garments that appeal to women her age.

Skirts and dresses were fashioned from pillowcases and vintage buttons. She made a halter top from a man's dress shirt, circa 1970 . She altered a leotard - who wears those now? -and added fabric from other dresses to create a short dress. Her favorite in the collection is a silky gray, pink and cream striped dress. She added a gathered peplum to the front of it for a layered or tiered skirt effect. Vintage red buttons were added for details.

"It's very flattering on because it creates an hourglass figure," the diminutive Cox says.

Take a stroll through Design Archives with her and you'll start to see outdated clothing differently. Even a dress from the '80s - one with shoulder pads and sleeves that poof out like lamp shades - can be restructured.

An oversize, cowl-neck purple sweater looks like something Jennifer Beals might have worn over a leotard in the movie "Flashdance." But it's a great color - a deep purple, like the children's character Barney. Cox, who enrolled in UNCG initially as an art major, is attracted to garments with vivid colors.

If the sweater were taken in to better fit the female figure, it would be more updated. Remove the sleeves and shorten it, and it could be a vest.

"I really like clothing, and I really feel like there's something interesting about vintage because (of) its history," Cox says.

The older a garment, the more imperfect its condition. But that's part of its appeal, Cox says. Worn fabric, tiny holes and sun stains don't deter her. She can hide or cover the holes. Sometimes a discoloration can add an interesting pattern to a garment.

"I kind of feel like the people who are going to buy this stuff are going to have an appreciation for vintage stuff," Cox says.

Design Archives is a giant treasure chest for someone like her. She became a store regular through friends. "We would go, and we would spend hours and hours literally trying on everything," she says.

Cox's mother taught her to sew and encouraged her interest in fashion. But it was Design Archives owner Kit Rodenbough who is responsible for her foray into upcycled vintagewear.
Rodenbough, a lifelong vintage-clothing collector, says Cox reminds her of herself at that age. In fact, Cox was just hired to design children's wear for Bonaventure, a company Rodenbough worked for about 30 years ago.

Rodenbough remembers seeing Cox for the first time at a UNCG fashion show.

"I thought she looked like Björk, a lovely little Scandinavian princess," Rodenbough says. "She was flitting around taking care of all of her models."

Cox, who has fair skin, dark eyes and long, dark hair - like the musician Björk - giggles at the comparison.
"I was trying to make sure (the models) were eating," she says.

Cox started making and selling her upcycled clothing at Design Archives last year. She began with damaged items or those that weren't selling. Rodenbough says the designs sold so well that Cox started making more clothing from Design Archives' surplus of men's dress shirts.

Cox spent hours hunched over Rodenbough's sewing machine in a room at the back of the store. She'd get so caught up in her work that she often forgot to eat. She completed the collection for Saturday's show in just a few months.
Unlike the work she has done for shows at UNCG, Cox feels prepared for her debut. And Design Archives is practically her home away from home.

She's friends with all of her models, and both of her "moms" will be there: Her parents are coming from Raleigh, and, of course, Rodenbough will be there, too, assisting her protege.

Contact Tina Firesheets at 373-3498 or tina.firesheets@news-record.com