Jami Johnson: Fashion and Design
Graphic and fashion designer Jami Johnson works as part of “a tight knit team” for Blue Fish Clothing in Fairfield, Iowa. “I never thought I’d be moved back to a small town in Midwest and working at a clothing line doing fashion design,” she tells me. Her resume includes work at an Egyptian graphic design agency, fashion design school in NYC, women’s soft goods and fashion design at Burton, and BCBG in LA, along with 5 years taken off to snowboard in Colorado. In 2012, Jami returned to her hometown of Fairfield. “Fairfield is so open-ended,” she says, “There’s such an entrepreneurial spirit here. With internet, social and media marketing, you don’t have to live in a large city to accomplish your dreams.”
Her 9-5 at Blue Fish involves working closely with owner Jennifer Barclay. “I help pick color palettes, prepare screens for screen-printing, pull together the images for printing designs on the new collection, and recently started drawing sketches.”
Jami describes Blue Fish designs as “lagenlook, an eclectic, happy-go-lucky look that you can layer.” Somehow, that description fits Jami, who balances a 9-5 with volunteer work on Fairfield’s trail system, EcoJam, various community projects including choir, and an active social life.
“Anything I can put my artistry into, I want to do it!” Jami says. “When I moved back, I wanted to make Fairfield my canvas. I have a wide variety of things I do. A lot of opportunities come up through word of mouth.”
Distressing clothing for “Last Tree Standing”
For instance, Jami signed up when EcoJam needed volunteers. By 2014, and again in 2015, she was artistic director. Working with a core crew, her team bumped the event up several notches. Gareth Bell, Holden Ketterhagen, and other MIU students rented equipment from the university media department and produced videos for the fashion show. “EcoJam is very popular,” Jami says. “We had about 490 people in the audience. We showed 12 lines from 13 designers and involved 700 people in the community. That’s about 7% of the population of Fairfield. I like to throw a party,” she laughs.
Jami also took on costume design and production with Gage Blanton for Last Tree Standing, a film written and directed by Agnes Baginska as part her MIU MA in Film. “I pulled together 15 looks that we totally distressed using bags of bricks (toss in a leather jacket and beat it to pieces) and a car (attach clothing to a rope/chain and drag over miles of dirt and gravel roads) to create an authentic post-apocalyptic, Mad Max look.”
How does she do it all? Her enthusiasm and commitment to community life reflect well on her extended family that has farmed in this area for 127 years. “My grandma was a hostess with the mostess,” she tells me. “I love designing, organizing and staging events. It’s stressful but I love it. I’m organized. Event planning brings so much entertainment and joy.”
I ask how she manages everything. “I function best under pressure,” she replies. “Exercise and Transcendental Meditation, balanced with a social life works for me.” I ask if she’s on board for EcoJam 2016. “We kick it into gear in January,“ she says, “I can’t say no.”
Mo Ellis is inspired by art, issues, and progressive ideas. Mo Ellis’ online and print contributions as a writer, editor, website & mobile app project manager, PR and online media director have appeared at: "O" magazine, The Huffington Post, The New York Times, The Des Moines Register, Surface Design Journal, The Iowa Source, KRUU-FM, Iowa Public Radio, Dr. Mercola and Dr. Oz.