Broken Mirror's Blog
What's in a name?
What's in a name?
This is the story of our name...
Names are very important and set the vision for a brand.
Back in 2018, when we first started Broken Mirror,
We had another name…but it didn't quite fit.
So we changed it.
Alayna McLain wearing our Red Rose Corset and "Concrete" Gray Skirt.
When we started our brand, my sister Melissa and I knew we wanted our name to incorporate a song.
We’re both very emotionally connected to music and share our feelings with songs.
I also really wanted to name it after a Nirvana song.
Our family loves Nirvana...
Dad played a lot of Nirvana and Melissa’s always been into punk music.
Consistent with our tree theme given we're a family-owned
Eco-friendly small business.
Keep hugging trees!!...
Entrepreneurship is also kind of like rock and roll…
We all reflected, discussed ideas, went back in forth, around in circles.
Nothing fit. We still didn’t find the right Nirvana song. :(
Then one day at the park, while swinging to clear my head,
Michael Jackson’s song, “Man in the Mirror” came on my playlist.
I’ve always loved this song and found it so uplifting and inspiring.
The kind of song that makes you want to change.
Perfect for a message about sustainability and hope.
“I’m starting with the man in the mirror.
I’m asking him to make a change.
And no message could’ve been any clearer.
If they want to make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and
Then make a change.”
Kathie Miranda in our Wildfire Dress.
It hit me hard for many reasons.
I also fell in love with the word, mirror.
Fashion is an industry filled with mirrors and I immediately pictured runways.
Mirrors are a huge theme with sustainability.
They reflect light back into space instead of absorbing heat.
Glaciers, for example, act as mirrors. As light hits the earth,
they reflect it back into space instead of
absorbing it in our oceans.
As they melt, our oceans absorb more heat and get hotter.
Save the Ice: we need more mirrors.
Jiaqi Chen wearing our signature Glacier Gown.
Mirrors also represent truth.
Like the Hall of Mirrors, they show it back to us:
No filters needed.
Yes, but what kind of mirror for our name?...
A few days later after many ideas, Melissa added “broken” as an idea.
Inspired from another song by Jack Johnson.
We love his music:a surfer, an environmentalist who sings about recycling –
The three Rs! Yes!! Also our “sister song.”
Yes we fight, like siblings do, but we know we're better together.
We put the words together and it became our name.
Broken Mirror—and it fit like couture.
Melissa and I founded the company together
because we both love fashion and beauty.
We love its creativity, transformation, and fun.
The sparkle: a creative outlet.
We love clothes. Our mom loves to sew and taught us as girls.
She taught us to mend clothes, not throw them away.
We’re also a women-owned small business.
We started our brand to offer ethical, sustainable options.
Glass ceilings?... Smash, smash!
Sydney Williamson wearing our Chess Queen.
Libérée délivrée.
We believe the current fashion industry is broken.
Especially from fast fashion.They made clothing disposable:
A sea of cheap, disposable knock-offs, as Anna Wintour says.
No wonder the fashion industry has the world’s second
highest carbon footprint after oil.
Let's wake up and smell the gasoline...
The solution?
Just like glass...let in the light!
Go green: Choose ethical and sustainable.
Believe in change.
A few months later, I stopped by my parents’ house
for a visit and decided to clean their kitchen floors. Cleaning relaxes me
and it’s my way of helping out. Each individual
Tile needs scrubbing with Pine Sol...in-between cracks.
I scrubbed the floor while Melissa did laundry and
We put on some Nirvana while cleaning together.
The song “Lithium” came on my playlist after "Smells like Teen Spirit."
“I’m so ugly, that’s okay, ‘cause so are you. Broke our mirrors.
Sunday morning is everyday, for all I care
And I’m not scared. Light my candles in a daze
‘Cause I’ve found God."
Melissa and I flipped around and looked at each other.
What did he just say?...OMG, rewind the song!!!
“I’m so ugly, that’s okay, ‘cause so are you...
Broke our mirrors..."
CHILLS!!
I got my wish...We broke our mirrors!
NIRVANA: a state of enlightenment.
Amen.
Lithium—how perfect for our brand story!
It's key to the sustainability debate, and brings an added
warning that some “solutions” bring more environmental harm.
It's also used as a mood stabilizer, which makes sense as
Cobain struggled with Bi-Polar; mental health matters.
Fun fact: when I started the company in 2018,
I slept with a poster of Kurt Cobain playing guitar above my bed.
I couldn’t get enough Nirvana at that time and played it on repeat,
Dreaming of fashion.
A rose by any other name would smell as sweet!
We wanted both inclusion and anti-conformity in our story.
We wanted to create a safe space within fashion where everyone
felt beautiful, included and uplifted: free to be themselves.
One where every color of the rainbow is beautiful.
We combined it all.
The perfect name and reminder that pieces fall into place.
"I like it, I’m not gonna crack."
Robin Williams wearing our Rainbow Dress.
By Jennifer Lully