Thrifted items and clothing scraps spread across his workspace each carefully examined before it is cut, stitched, or pinned. Junior Raf Pena begins working on his newest design with a clear picture in mind.
Pena redesigns old thrifted clothes as a way to create something completely new without buying new pieces. He learned basic sewing techniques from a neighbor and now applies those to a variety of different items including pants, jackets, and dresses.
“I try to make something new, consistently and try to always be working on a project because it helps keep me busy,” Pena said. “I would say it’s probably about once every two weeks that I make something new.“
While Pena spends hours redesigning his latest products he often turns to junior Avery Mcleary to talk through his latest designs. McCleary explains she has gotten to see him in the process of creating these designs and that it is an interesting process to watch.
“I think it’s a really cool way to express yourself because you’re choosing your own fashion instead of having to go find clothes,” McCleary said. “But it’s also cool because he creates the clothes and he actually makes the designs too.”
Pena explains that there isn’t necessarily a specific brand or designer that inspires his creations, instead he is inspired to make his wardrobe something that he is proud of. However, if he sees something by a specific brand that he thinks looks cool, he will try to make it.
“I figured that I don’t really want to spend a lot of money to get clothing items from different stores, when I could just make it myself,” Pena said. “For example, I have this one pair of pants that I added zippers to, and they turned out really cool.”
Everything that Pena uses to create his new designs are thrifted from various different thrift stores. According to Pena, he saves hundreds of dollars per year creating his own clothes and designs.
“I think that it’s great that he is recycling older clothes and then you can easily just go thrift some clothes and turn it into something completely new,” McCleary said. “It’s a lot cheaper than going and buying something expensive.”
Pena also often turns to junior Camden Williams to talk about his latest designs. According to Williams, along with Pena, he also has an interest in design and is often inspired by Pena’s designs.
“I think he’s super creative and he has an interesting style which makes his designs different from other brands,” Williams said. “I think it’s really cool that he decided to pursue design in high school.”
After high school, Pena explains he plans to continue design in a design school and later work at a luxury brand. He plans to go to the Savannah College of Art and Design although he is still looking at some other different schools.
“I really like making statement pieces that people will ask about which lets me tell them that I made them myself,” Pena said.”But I plan to focus on accessory design or clothing design when I get out of high school.”
According to Pena, to test his skills he has been making various different designs in the past month from a dress for his mom to reworking pants and even to creating jackets. Although he explains he has been doing a lot of reworking on pants in the past couple of weeks, his current projects include jackets.
“One of my recent projects was recreating a jacket from another old jacket and that turned out pretty cool,” Pena said. “I also recently crafted a workwear jacket out of a zebra print table cloth that I was really proud of.”
McCleary explains Pena’s projects often inspire her because he creates unique clothes that not everybody has. According to McCleary, her and others of her peers including junior Deuce Brown are often inspired by Pena’s work.
“Designing is such a cool thing to do,” Brown said. “Not everyone in high school can think of something like that.”
