For Lizette Arenas, what started out as creating dresses out of her mom’s curtains, became a dream come true when she became a fashion designer.
Today, the 29-year-old artist is owner of her own fashion brand, Obscurity Designs.
“It was strange because I never realized it until I was already older. When I was 17, I started going back and realizing that it started from a young age,” Arenas said. “I used to get my mom’s curtains and pin them on my sister and just make dresses out of it, and little by little I started picking up that that’s what I wanted to focus on and I ended up enrolling at the El Paso Community College for the fashion program, and it was worth it I learned a lot.”
Arenas said that the reason behind the name of her brand is due to the moments of obscurity everybody has experienced. She wanted to sport a meaningful name, as well as represent her designs.
“My signature and my aesthetic is a form where I find darkness within everybody. It’s something I try to project in the way that people always think, that when it is obscure or dark, it’s negative,” Arenas said. “That darkness within them—I want to mutate it and transform it into something that has more of a light, which is showing and expressing it with mysteriousness, elegance and uniqueness.”
Arenas says the best way to form a collection is to draw a lot of sketches, which inspire what the collections means for her by always keeping the aesthetic and focus on the obscurity within it.
Building a collection is not just about fashion to Arenas, but also about growth.
“I see myself growing more than ever as a person and not only growing, but learning within myself when I’m making my designs, and I’ve seen that happening from day one to now. I’ve changed and I learned a lot about my techniques,” Arenas said. “Every collection that I do, they’re based more on my emotions and I transform it into garments, and I guess the only motivation that I have is when I’m working on something. I won’t feel satisfied until I’m creating something.”
In 2014, Arenas presented her first collection, “Fallen Angel,” at the El Paso Fashion Week. Since then she has released her “Crimson Collection,” Stargaze Collection” and her most recent collection, “Memento Mori.”
Depending on how simple or complicated a piece is, Arenas said that it takes between two to five days to complete the final product.
“As an artist, I think I matured a lot. I know that my focus is now more centered than before,” Arenas said. “I used to have more ideas and they were all scattered and I didn’t know how to put them together, and it’s funny that throughout that time you end up having that focus.”
Arenas said that when it’s a custom job, it takes at least a month to complete the order. She not only has to make the sketch, but also buy all the fabric and make the piece itself to bring the client’s idea to life.
As an El Pasoan, she is thankful for events such as El Paso Fashion Week and the Mercedes Benz Fashion Week, and she believes the fashion scene in El Paso is making a statement, little by little.
“I see a lot of people are fashion forward now, and it’s something that’s barely constructing,” she said. “A lot of fashion designers have been stepping out and showing their stuff and that makes me happy because it gives people opportunities for others to understand that they’re people who work hard for they believe and what they create,
As a fashion designer and artist, Arenas said that she will enroll at UTEP this summer to pursue a career in psychology and business to help her become a counselor. She wants to help young designers have a better idea about how the fashion industry works.
For more information visit obscuritydesigns.bigcartel.com.
