Jacynth Bassett, 31, founded The Bias Cut after years of frustration that her mum, Marilyn, now 71, wasn’t being catered for by designers. She chats to Editor-in-Chief Katy Sunnassee about her deviation from law into fashion, and her mission to promote older women as models and in the media, including the viral social media campaign #ILookMyAge.
WORDS: KATY SUNNASSEE.
I had no background in fashion – it was a passion but not something I thought I’d do for work. I studied law at Cambridge and became President of the Cambridge Law Society; I’d realised I didn’t want to be a lawyer, but I enjoyed the business side of law and leading the society. So, someone suggested I consider going into business instead. It was one of those lightbulb moments. But, if I was going to get into business, it needed to be something I enjoyed. I thought, “What do I love?” – the answer was fashion!
I wanted to do something that made a difference. Fashion can have an amazing impact but it can also have a detrimental one. I started thinking about my mum; we both shared a love of fashion but, as a teenager, I had started to notice how she was increasingly feeling alienated by the industry. She loved style, she had disposable income, she wanted to look good, but she struggled to find anything to wear. When we’d go shopping, she’d end up buying clothes for me, not her. She’d say, “I can’t wear it, you have it”. Mum was struggling to find clothes she wanted; she didn’t want to wear frumpy, dowdy, old-fashioned things; she wanted to be contemporary. I thought about times shop assistants would say to her, “I don’t think you can wear that”. And online everything was modelled by younger women. This all inspired me, back in 2012, to create a shopping platform for older women.
I finished my degree and took modules that were more business focused. When I graduated in 2013, age 21, I spent a year and a half researching and developing the business idea. I went to events and spoke to women. Many had a very similar experience of being ignored as they got older.
I went to one big fashion magazine event where most of the girls were my age. I got in a queue and started chatting to a lady aged 60 and she said a member of staff had just told her she didn’t belong there as it “wasn’t for her age”. I was outraged! Sadly I’ve got so many of these examples and anecdotes from women being made to feel they didn’t belong.
Mum and I were once at a big designer’s private fashion show and pop-up event. It featured lots of beautiful dresses, and Mum said to the designer, “What can
