Designer’s Designer: Nina Egli of Toujours Toi Family Affairs Gets Sketchy With Her 11:11 Notebook
Before Nina Egli made a name for herself with her lines Toujours Toi and Family Affairs, she was crafting in a tiny apartment with her BFF Jamila. Now Jamila has her own thing going, too: a quirky notebook and wallet line 11:11 that her pal obviously obsesses over. —julia silverman
Left: Nina poses with her fave notebook. Right: A sketch of the Million Miles dress by Toujours Toi Family Affairs.
“When I met Jamila nine years ago through a Craigslist apartment ad, I had no idea I was also meeting one of my best friends. We would both sit in our teeny rooms all day making things, and years later, we’re both still at it. For this 11:11 notebook, Jamila created a whole key decoding the symbols on its cover: The diamond bunnies stand for prosperity, and the mango for love, fertility, and bliss. I carry the notebook with me on all my travels. It’s useful for my sketches, but it’s also a good luck charm that warms my heart.” —nina
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Eight Nominations for Songs of the Summer
We asked our very tuned-in designers to provide us with a playlist.
Whenever we sit down to talk to designers, the topic of music inevitably comes up. Since the designers we work with are far more musically savvy (and all-around cool) than us, we turned to them for eight tracks to get us through the next couple months. —erica
Some of the most prized records in Toujours Toi Family Affairs designer Nina Egli’s collection.
1) “Devil Hearts Grow Gold” by Las Sera, as nominated by Nina Egli of Toujours Toi Family Affairs: “It’s just so dreamy. It makes me want to stroll through flower fields and take a nap—and not work.”
2) “Composure” by Warpaint, as nominated by Hillary Taymour of Collina Strada: “It was the first band I saw at Coachella, which pretty much started my summer. All the girls are super cute, and their whole album The Fool is amazing.”
3) “Bar-B-Q” by Wendy Rene, as nominated by Ellen van Dusen of Dusen Dusen: “This is my jam of the summer because, hey, I like barbecues.”
4) “California Girls” by The Beach Boys, as nominated by Caroline Ventura of Brvtvs: “Whenever I listen to it, I am instantly transported back to growing up on the beach in So-Cal, learning how to surf, and digging for sand crabs.”
5) “Flying Overseas” by Theophilus London, as nominated by Matt Singer: “It’s about travel and love—and has a super easy summer vibe.”
6) “Secret Lover” by That Work, as nominated by Lyndsey Butler of Veda: “It makes me want to be the last one on the dance floor.”
7) “Home” by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, as nominated by Sarah Fox of Cursive Design: “My husband and I are on a month-long road trip across the country. I’ve never been away from home/work for this long, and I’m curious to find the routines that make me feel grounded. That sense of home will probably come from my husband—I am always at home in his company, and that’s what I love about this song.”
8) “Beercan” by Beck, as nominated by Annie Larson of ALL Knitwear: “I have been listening to Beck a lot again this summer. It’s still good—better, actually.”
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How Nina Gets her Acting Fix
Designing a clothing collection involves character development, too.
Before Nina Egli got into design—first launching a jewelry line, and then adding clothing offshoot Toujours Toi Family Affairs—she was an actress. Now, instead of memorizing lines and taking directors’ notes, she puts her character-development training to use. “When you’re reading a play, you’re thinking, ‘Who is this character? What is she wearing?’ I think that helps me when creating a collection—in creating something more than just clothing,” Nina explains. Here, she walks us through the story and the girl behind the lighthearted spring collection and lookbook.
Click here to score one of the 13 breezy, devil-may-care tunics the mother-daughter team created exclusively for Of a Kind.
“You know those summers when you were younger and carefree? That’s what I wanted to capture this season. I keep going back to the summer before college when I spent a lot of time listening to music, travelling to France—you know, taking the overnight train and just being.”
“We actually shot the lookbook at a cemetery in Zurich, but it looks like a British garden. I was really into the structure of it. Last year, we shot at a very wild park, and this is softer.”
“I imagine all of the pieces in the collection in a little suitcase packed for the South of France. You need something to walk around in, something else you could wear to a party. I wanted to make it a very fun and light collection—feminine but not too girly. I like the kind of independence you have in that phase, and, for me, it was also a time with no cell phone.”
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Nina Brags About Her Mom
And justifiably so: The Beatles were among her mother’s fans.
Pieces from the duo’s spring collection hanging in Nina’s Fort Greene apartment-slash-studio.
Nina Egli of the Brooklyn- and Zurich-based line Toujours Toi Family Affairs fell into fashion without intention, but her mother and co-designer Kaya made her mark in the field years before, bringing hard-earned skills and some real hippie cred to their young company. Here, Nina shares her mom’s early work, which influences their creations today.
One of Kaya’s sketches from her Apple shop days, circa 1969.
“My mother went straight from high school to design school in Paris where she started dating a guy who was big into the textile industry in Marseilles. She moved there with him in the sixties. His parents had a cinema, so my mom and her boyfriend opened their first shop in the foyer of the theater—which is so cool. They had a mix of vintage and designer, and she had her own line there.
By then, my uncle was a soloist at the Royal Ballet in London, and he convinced my mom to move there. She ended up being hired by the Beatles for the Apple shop! Like, her work visa is signed by one of the Beatles. Her setup was downstairs. Jimi Hendrix or whoever would come in, and she would design him a shirt, a one-of-a-kind thing—she would draw it, and a seamstress would make it. There weren’t photos of everything then like there are now—she can’t say, ‘Here’s a picture of Brian Jones wearing these pants I made.’ But sometimes we’ll see footage on TV, and she’ll say, ‘I think I might have designed that.’
We take a lot from her archives, from what she did in the sixties and seventies. I’ll have a story in mind—an idea for lengths and for shapes—and we’ll say ‘Oh, maybe we can pull from ‘68 or ‘74.’ Eventually, she moved to Switzerland and did a whole line for this really cool store called Brasilia. She worked until I was born and didn’t design again until she launched Toujours Toi Family Affairs with me.”
Get a taste of the Egli aesthetic and score the tunic Toujours Toi Family Affairs made exclusively for Of a Kind right here.
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Nina and Kaya’s Inspiration Swap
Both Tommy Ton and Woody Allen get the duo excited.
Not only is Toujours Toi Family Affairs a mother-daughter operation, but it’s also a bi-continental one: Nina Egli splits her time between Brooklyn and Zurich, where her mom Kaya lives, and they do much of the designing of their free-spirited clothing line with an ocean between them. “At times, it’s almost helpful, because I have to condense my inspirations,” Nina explains. “I collect them all in my head or on a computer and then send them to her. Blogs have become really important to our relationship.” Here are six sources that, according to Nina, have made the transatlantic voyage.
MOVIE - Another Woman
“We were both really excited about Woody Allen’s movie Another Woman with Gena Rowlands—the winter fabrics, the mood, everything was just, like, ooh.”
BLOG - Jak & Jil
“My mom sends me links all the time. She’ll say, ‘Did you see this on Tommy Ton’s site?’ She really likes sharp images.”
ALBUM - Bringing It All Back Home
“There’s a lot of Bob Dylan stuff I’ll never part with, even though I’m not a Bob Dylan freak or anything. The cover art of Bringing It All Back Home is my favorite. I have it here and also in Switzerland.”
BLOG - Park & Cube
“My mom discovers these blogs, and I’m like, ‘How did you find that!?’ Park and Cube, for example—I heard about it through a very cool friend from Switzerland.”
MOVIE - Working Girl
“I always blog about movies I’ve seen, and then she tries to rent them from the library. I like eighties movies like Working Girl—there’s something about the storytelling.”
BLOG - Turned Out
“I really like Maya’s blog, Turned Out. We have the same taste in girls. I don’t have much interest in the Sartorialist-type women—they’re all really pretty and luxe. Maya’s are more distinct—more about the little things.”
Nina and Kaya created a very wearable tunic just for Of a Kind. Grab up one of only 13 now!
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Toujours Toi Family Affairs
Before Nina Egli was born, her mother Kaya was a designer—and a member of the sixties creative set. (At one point, she lived with Michelle Phillips of The Mamas & the Papas.) But while growing up in Switzerland, Nina never considered following in her footsteps. “I studied filmmaking. When I was in acting school in New York, I was trying to make money, and no one would hire me because of visas. So I started making these charm bracelets, and stores picked them up right away,” Nina explains. “It was a very naive start.”
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Of a Kind
Claire has already proclaimed her love for the maxi dress, and this one from Family Affairs is just so damn classy—very non-boho (like me). It’s designed by the mother-daughter duo Kaya and Nina Egli. Yes, mother-daughter. My head is spinning.
