We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Bianca Mcleod a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Bianca thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

With any new skill, to me personally, it’s important to start from behind the scenes and do a lot of research. I spent a lot of time just reading (to this day) and memorizing certain key terms that were common in the field I was trying to emerge more into. I use to enjoy reading articles that typically were published 20+ years ago because with technology advancing, I think many ways learning, are shortened and made easier to do, which is okay but I like to adapt to both old and new ways in some cases. At the current pace I am at, I have thought about how much more networking I could have done to speed up my journey and getting my clothing pieces out, but continuing to learn more sewing skills, practicing and making sure I got all I need (notions, fabric, etc) is much more essential to me right now, and has been for quite some time. I have peace with that! Skills that were much more essential to me in the beginning stages was one, mastering patience when things don’t seem to go your way. Another thing is knowing what mindset you are can be helpful to and playing apart of how you work. I didn’t have many obstacles in the way of learning, only working certain jobs and the scheduling, but even with that I still gave myself time out of the day, being able to do both.

Bianca , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

My name is Bianca and I am the owner and creative director behind ShopB.Line, an online based clothing store which all garments are handmade and designed by me. I also offer alteration services as a seamstress for my local area which is Charlotte, NC. I originally got into sewing about a year after graduating NC A&T with a biology degree in 2016, creating B.Line fully in 2018. I still wanted to pursue my science field but often times my mind would drift off into wanting to learn a new creative skill. I had already been a photographer for about 6 years at the time and just wanted something to add on, but meaningful and enjoyable. My grandma was a seamstress before her passing, and I was always intrigued on the idea that she would literally make and line suites up from scratch. Being from Jamaica with two children and adapting to major change, the idea of still wanting to build a skill, was so admirable to me. She was exceptional at what she did and loved every moment of it.

Looking back, I’m honestly still surprised I stuck with sewing up until now because I use to allow myself to get distracted a lot. It’s like when I locked in more with myself and stayed consistent, my desire to learn and study, grew. I had to distance myself from a lot of old habits to help me find more of what I wanted out of B.Line moving forward and years from now. The garments I create are primarily for a women audience but recently start incorporating men garments into the mix. I include accessories in the bunch as well! I came up with “The Curvy Minimalist” being someone who embraces their size with a simple yet immaculate bold style. I try to shoot for most sizes and go for fabrics that have great stretch. I have a new venture within B.Line coming in 2023 which involves pieces for your home which will also be included in my brand. Can’t wait to share more detail in the new year.

Something that makes me proud and happy is there is no stopping point with sewing; such a huge range. If you are new to it, keep going, it gets better if you really like to do it. Come up with a budget for your collections, saves so much time knowing what you will be working with and how much. I work alone mostly with creating pieces, packaging, curating the package and promotion details, taking the photos, social media management, and much more! It can get overwhelming but not necessarily in a bad way. When I first start making actual pieces, my biggest thing was to have models of different sizes to show how the style can be enjoyed. I luckily had friends willing to model my clothes because I wanted to focus more on creating. I like to stay busy with sewing and I’ll let it take up most of my days sometimes. I do love that part of owning my own business. The pretty and not so pretty parts always go hand and hand. One thing I think stands out about me is I’m not a big fashion guru, but I still know how to create some bomb pieces! I always thought it would set me back but I’m someone who still knows how to put pieces together or envision how I would like it to come out.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

A lesson I had to learn was you can’t feel no ways with doing everything on your own and not having someone at your side for each part of the grind. In my case, I took paths alone that I was okay with and the grind felt so much better. It has to be YOU vs YOU a lot of time and it’s also not a race unless you want to get there fast. Some people can have your best interest or least. The right resources, people and surroundings will make its way to you throughout the building up process, you just have to trust it. You have to go out there and create those opportunities for yourself because others may be working on themselves too! That’s not saying no one will be some sort of aid (helping mailing orders out, second opinions on designs, etc) it’s just saying you got to expect more out of yourself. I was the only person around who knew how to sew what I needed and it became quite challenging where when I had a lot of orders, I would feel defeated because I strive for perfection pretty much when sending anyone anything and didn’t feel I was bringing that energy. I just learned to give myself more grace and time my days out better and give myself clear deadlines that didn’t seem bad. Nothing will be perfect, but you can perfect your brand and be okay with challenges.

How did you build your audience on social media?

Although I am still growing at a steady pace, I had some of my close people knowing I would start selling clothes but making behind the scene videos and just advertising B.Line any chance I could get. So, starting off from my personal profiles on social media, I would keep letting people know something was coming. Now people come out with clothing brands a lot of times so that wasn’t just going to cut it. During the beginning of Covid, I took a chance on myself and advertised my masks to a big audience on Facebook. From there, after making over 200 masks, I would start showing off more garments I was creating to give people an insight on B.Line past the masks. I eventually started working with friends to help model the pieces and start getting a few lookers from all over the US on one of my first summer designs that was pink top with puffy sleeves that caught the interest of many. Now my followers range from so many places, I never imagined it because it’s all still new to me. I interact with many of my followers from across the country, and it amazes me how I can keep cool threads as well as warm threads at the same time due to different weather conditions and locations. So, I definitely suggest word of mouth anywhere you go. Business cards will always be in, and you can put all your social media handles on there while promoting yourself to whomever that may be.

Contact Info:

• Website: theblin3shop.com
• Instagram: shopb.line
• Facebook: ShopB.Line

Image Credits
Bianca M