Abc. 123. by Advisory Board Crystals

 

Remington Guest and Heather Haber founded Advisory Board Crystals in the backseat of an uberPool in 2015. With a spiritual and guiding aesthetic plus intriguing ideas and concepts such as crystal-infused dying techniques and the Abc. Pulse Pocket™ (A pocket that is a safe place for mobile devices blocking the radio waves that move toward your body, but allows for them to flow safely out and away from you) ABC have set themselves apart from other brands on the market.

 

To welcome Advisory Board Crystals to Supply, we asked Remington & Heather some questions about their crystal-inspired brand.

 

 

Supply: For starters, what crystals do you both think everyone needs as a part of their daily lives?

 

ABC: Really anything you gravitate towards. For us, it’s more about a visceral reaction. Seeing something and wanting it for reasons beyond a prescribed approach.

 

Supply: How has the pandemic impacted your approach towards designing a collection around crystals??

 

ABC: It really hasn’t. A lot of what we do has been laid out formally in our minds from the moment we began and what we do to this day veers very little from that original plan.

 

 

Supply: How important was getting these “building block” pieces right for the collection and how long have you guys been working on the basics range for the brand?

 

ABC: Incredibly important. It is something we came up with on a road trip to Texas in 2015 and have wanted to do since then. It’s one of the integral pieces of the Abc. universe we are building. All parts coexist and each is better with the other. All of our programs are never complete. It’s a similar saying to what Walt Disney said about his parks, “Disneyland will never be completed. It will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world.” We are always iterating and improving. Abc. is our life and everything we create has to work the way we want it to. We wear these things daily which allows us to notice something new or have a new idea about how something should be in the next iteration.

 

 

Supply: The quality of all the ABC garments are top level. How do you guys go about sourcing these fabrics. Has it been a constant trial and error type of process over the years to find the right blends etc?

 

ABC: We create them. We actually custom knit most fabrics with our fabric mills. It’s quite an intense process and is incredibly time consuming but we believe it to be worth while in the end. We’ve had luck getting it right generally quite quickly but, again, we fine tune things from time to time. Sometimes it’s just time for a change or we’ll wake up and think, this should be like this now.

 

 

Supply: We love the ethos on making something that lasts till the very end. How important is sustainability and ethical practices in the brand?

 

ABC: Incredibly important. On a personal level we are people that like to own things forever. We don’t want something that we won’t, at least in the moment, believe that we will have and cherish forever. We built the 123 items to last so they would end up in a vintage shop one day. Down to the thread gauges, every 123 garment is truly thought through. Every piece of rib, label, button. It’s all made for 123 and manufactured to be the highest quality garment it can possibly be.

 

 

Supply: The colour palette for this Summer range is absolute stunning! Why did you select the crystal/colours for this opening Abc. 123 collection?

 

ABC: Thank you! We love this palette. They were colors that we felt were special neutrals with that electric blue thrown in. For the first collection we chose this sort of palette as we felt it to be the most wearable colors. Most of our designs to this point have been less subtle so we wanted to try and choose colors and tones that were just that but had a special feeling to them. Even our white is a specific shade that feels just right. Not too white, not too dull, not vintage, but perfect. We feel that way about our black as well. With a collection of this nature, color is a big part of the appeal so it was quite important.

 

 

Supply: How do you guys go about pairing quotes with your garments?

 

ABC: A few ways ! We have a running list that we write down, but a lot of it comes with the collection theme and feeling we get when we see a garment. A lot of the time it just comes to us - nothing is forced its a natural flow. Otherwise things will come off as ‘designed’. Abc. Is such a personal body of work for us so it isn’t often difficult to attach text and feeling to something.

 

Supply: You guys are a fan of Andy Goldsworthy right? Can we expect any projects in the future with him?

 

ABC: Huge fans. We’ve known of his work for the better part of 15 years. That would be a dream. We have quite a few collaborative projects coming with some amazing artists that we are also quite excited about.

 

 

Supply: Tell us about “ism’s”

 

ABC: We wanted to do the collection as we started thinking about “isms" more and more. Often current events, or the state of the world leads us to think of things in an abstract way. Dealing with something that is bothering you, or maybe adjusting your way of thinking. We put these things out as a gut response and choose in this case isms based on what is meaningful and helpful to us, but also as a bit of a statement and learning exercise for our community. The history and meaning behind each ism is much deeper than the definition itself which we do our best to portray.

 

 

Supply: Pulse Pockets are an amazing design! For people that are unfamiliar tell us a little about this feature?

 

ABC: Such a great feature. Most people aren’t even aware we do this. It’s something we came up with as Heather would always tell Remington to stop putting his phone in his front pocket. Heather’s brother is an engineer and works in the field with emfs, phones etc, and told us a story about a girl he knew that kept her phone in her back pocket at all times and developed cancer there. The effects of emfs are something we were already aware of and have that sort of hippie mentality when it come to phone signals. We don’t want it near us! But, that isn’t really a possibility and we aren’t that extreme. We developed this pocket as a safe place to store your phone. Took a bunch of testing to ensure the fabric works as planned but it essentially protects the body from the emf’s and lets them out so your phone works. If done incorrectly, it can cause the inverse effect. Again, it’s something we created for us as we wear our collections and it just solves an issue that some others may appreciate as well. We always indicate the pocket with this tech with our pulse Logo, but it’s usually on the wearers right. We also only put it on one side, as the pocket construction is incredibly expensive and use it only when and where we think it needs to go. We get that question often!

 

 

Supply: The phone has taken over the way we view the world, what are some things you guys like to do to disconnect from them?

 

ABC: Well for one, we dont actively use our personal social media accounts. We also charge our phones in a room other than the bedroom and, well, do not disturb. We’re generally disconnected which we believe is a key aspect to happiness. We talk about this in our critical thinking collections. Much like Voltaire’s garden, focus on your own, not the plots of others.

 

Interview Questions by Dr. T

 

Thank you to the Advisory Board Crystals family.

 

Advisory Board Crystals' Abc 123. collection is now available at Supply

 

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