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Jill’s clothes are both modern yet evocative of fashion history. Her dresses that remain popular season after season (though done in different colors and fabrics – Jill uses both vintage and modern fabrics), are her suffragette suit and her Italian widow’s dress. Some of her pieces, especially when they are combined with other elements of her line, have a sort of timeless monastic ascetic that I adore. This spring, Jill did some of her Forties style dresses in fabulous vintage fabrics. Her vision celebrates womanhood and all its shapes and forms. Her clothes look great on teenagers, women in their 20’s, 30’s and 40’s, and women in their 50’s and 60’s. They look great on petit women, curvaceous women, tall thin women; in other words everyone can wear her creations. Jill Anderson has an impressive list of celebrity clients along with her loyal clients. Many of them are her "pant groupies" – Jill’s pants are cut great. I saw several pairs being tried on by our three models, all of whom were different heights and body sizes, and the pants fit everyone perfectly.

I can certainly understand becoming a Jill groupie; I think I’ve become one myself. When we were over at her store right before the shoot, I was looking around at all the delicious summer clothes, and told Jill soon I will need a 12-step program to curtail my Jill Anderson addiction!

Jill Anderson: Looking back at it, I really did not have the nerve to be a designer. I wasn’t an entrepreneurial spirit that I thought of. But my ex-husband was. He was Greek. And that was one of the only ways I think that he could convince me to move to Greece, because he said, "Oh, don’t worry. Italy’s right there. We’ll go get the Italian fabrics and we’ll do the wholesale in the United States." Because they do have production capabilities in Greece, too.

And so we get there, and I’m used to a certain kind of setup. So you need a pattern maker. "Oh, we can’t afford a pattern maker." So obviously I learned how to make my own patterns really quickly. You know? "We need a sample maker." "No, you get a machine and you do it yourself." You know?

And so I wholesaled to the United States from Greece. And I had a contracted showroom and I did a dress line. It was primarily dresses, not a full line collection at that time. That was the market that I’d come from.

But then I got this two hundred and fifty unit order from Bendel’s.

And it was a confirmed order, and we ordered the fabric and everything, and they cancelled. And my showroom accepted the cancellation and you know there was nothing that we could do. And so we were stuck with all this fabric that we had ordered for this huge purchase order, and what were we going to do?

So we opened up a store. And I just loved it. I loved it, I loved working with the customers. I loved developing my style. I loved seeing what worked on different people and, you know, I did all the production myself. Patterns, cutting, everything. It was pretty much a one woman show.

FF: And when you had the store in Athens, was it similar to the work you do now? Or did you make a big change in the look of your designs?

Jill Anderson: No. It’s very, very, very similar. My Italian widow’s dress was started there, three years before I even moved back here. That dress has been good for me for about six and a half years.

The Italian widow's dress with blue skirt underneath is shown at right.

But that was the wonderful thing about it. Because all of a sudden my line just started like developing.

And I could try all these neat things and develop them. And I love having a store. And I love doing my own patterns and, you know, developing that way, and trying different things out in the store. I mean doing a line is fun, but what’s great fun is doing one dress, and then putting three of them on the floor and just seeing instant reaction.

You know, is this going to fly? Can I do this in different material? I’ve got my sewing space full of bolts of material, because when I see something that I love, it’s like I have to own it. I have to work with it; I’m obsessive like that.

It’s like other people do with a pair of shoes. You know? But it’s really true. It’s awful. And so I’ve got fabrics that are -- you know, that are just waiting for homes.

It’s very exciting to me. So I loved doing it.

And then, everything fell apart with my husband and I, and basically I closed the store, packed a few belongings, and moved back to New York all in the space of a month. And I just knew it was either open up a store or be a hotel maid. And you know, something in my gut just said, you’re either going to survive this, or you’re not.

Coming back, I couldn’t complete sentences, you know? So I lucked out and got this store. And again, for the first year, I did all the sewing. I did everything here. And then the second year I hired somebody part time, and grew it from there.

FF: And what year was it that you opened the store on Ninth Street?

Jill Anderson: It was March six -- ninety six.

FF: Is it really just that recently?

Jill Anderson: Yeah, yeah. I flew into New York February fourth, ninety six. And I opened the store March -- well the funniest thing was that I had previously met somebody here, a Greek person, who had called me in Greece and said, you know I’m opening up a store in New York. Would you like to do something together? And so I said, well as it happens everything’s falling apart here, so yes. Now I have an alternative.

So you know that’s how it kind of like got me over here. And within two days of getting here, she handed me a contract that said I basically couldn’t design outside of the firm. And for as long as the firm was in existence.

And so, even if I got out of the contract, my name could still be used and everything, and I couldn’t design. I couldn’t work as a designer in the State of New York for as long as this contract -- so you know two days after I got here, I’ve got my store fixtures coming on a boat, and no place to put them, and nothing to do.

And so then I just like, okay, well, one foot in front of the other, and I just begged them, instead, to give me the store. I got great press in Greece, so I did this whole little presentation. No credit history here. Just enough money to be able to get the keys. No credit rating, no residence. You know. Nothing.

And I got it. You know, we women will pull together the strength that we need sometimes when we have to.

FF: Yes.

Jill Anderson: You know when I look back on it, I think, okay, that means that I can definitely get through today. If I did that then, I can do another day of this, you know?

FF: I know. I say that to myself, too. It’s like, if I’ve faced this down, I can face that down, you know? And it took a lot of courage to do that, having to start all over again essentially.

Jill Anderson: It’s like also you can say okay, if I lose it, if I lose this tomorrow, I’ll start again -- no matter what happens to me, I’ll be able to do something. That’s the thing, when you feel like you’re boxed in, and there’s nothing that you can do. That’s just what starts me to try to think of solutions, you know?