At this time of year, you can’t help but look back and think about all the things we are grateful for. For someone like me who is always working seasons ahead, I don’t often have the luxury of living in the current moment, let alone looking back and reflecting upon the last year.
The year kicked off with our last SLS meeting in January and an unseasonably cold freeze in Dallas. I remember how welcoming our hotel space was, presenting our new tier pricing structure, which has helped us throughout the year, and the excitement around the new Spring 2024 collection. |
 |
 |
We then headed to Asia and spent time in our factory in Vietnam and spent time with our Growing Elite earners, sharing some extraordinary experiences in extraordinary places, ending in attending the TAL annual dinner in Hong Kong together.
My next milestone event was shooting our fall Campaign in June, with the first location being Phillip Johnston’s Glasshouse in Fairfield, which has been on my bucket list of locations for some time. The second day of shooting was in a famous artist’s external studio that had been transformed into an extraordinary private residence complete with castle-like stone walls and rocky riverbanks.
After a short stint in my beloved Connecticut home and a wonderful summer evening hosted by Loro Piana in New York, I returned for our annual conference, where I felt an enormous pressure to add value to our brand across the stylist experience, not least launch the Fall Winter Collection. We hosted our mill partners and prepared a space to inspire and showcase our brand in the best way possible for our stylists attending the event. |
 |
In early fall, a short trip to London gave me the inspiration that I needed to continue thinking ahead and occasional out-of-the-box thinking to surprise and delight our clients with newness and collections that they can connect to both the practical need, but most importantly, in an aspirational way, finding things in our collections they didn’t even know they wanted.
Having just returned from shooting our next collection for Spring Summer 2025, in the run-up to the Holiday, the plans for the new year are well underway. A new and exciting Sales Leadership Meeting awaits us in January, newness across products, including a returning footwear partner we will announce shortly. |
 |
Over time, I have built an extraordinary team to help execute the vision of our brand both from J.Hilburn Home Office and an outside group of trusted freelance professionals, who, over the years, have been enormous help in creating all the assets and looks we all use every day in our business. These talented individuals are my chosen tribe, and I know I can always trust them to work tirelessly to bring the vision to life. I would like to introduce them to you virtually and recognize the work they do year-round from behind the scenes. |
 |
Lisa works our grooming and make-up as, believe it or not, our models don’t show up to set ready to go, and Lisa can transform them into Hollywood stars. Elliot is our tech who processes the assets to ensure balance, lighting consistency, and flawless imagery from Dinah’s magical hand behind the lens. We also work with a handful of experts who can prep, steam, iron, and fold our collections, making all the clothes look fresh and appear new despite being shipped, packed, worn, and pinned on set. Aaron is on top of my list, and he has worked tirelessly behind the scenes to make everything we do look like perfection and Brittany and Olivia are others that I can count on for this sometimes-thankless part of our execution. Our internal team is remarkably small, and Nicole, amongst her many roles in merchandising, manages the outfit labeling and tagging pre-upload into our systems, and Brandon, who, amongst his endless support for our brand across many touch points, can also prep, style, and adjust as we shoot. They both help me to put outfits and looks together, helping me with every detail as we create the seasonal library of looks.
Dinah’s talent as a photographer continues to raise the bar for all of us, and I am in awe of her ability to capture endless frames of beauty that make my job easy when editing the final selects. She then puts on her other hat as head of creative and oversees the retouching and production of our seasonal assets used digitally across our tech platforms, different screens, and, more recently, our printed lookbook to ensure a seamless experience and the outstanding quality of our brand. Creating the seasonal lookbook is no small feat, but Hailey brings it to life in both print and digital formats. Everyone on this team contributes in a significant way to our process, helping decide a thousand decisions needed in helping me execute the vision. |
 |
Thank you to everyone who makes J.Hilburn something special for our clients, our stylists, and our teams.
Happy Thanksgiving. |
