The Early Years of Immortelle: 2018 - Taking Root

In 2018, Immortelle stopped moving.

This was the year the work chose to remain.

I purchased the structure that would become Immortelle’s permanent home within the Ohio Renaissance Festival grounds—an honor not granted by application alone. At faire, permanence is bestowed, not assumed. You are chosen. And when the invitation came, I understood the weight of it immediately.

At the time of purchase, the building was little more than a roof and a deck. It offered no shelter, no enclosure, no protection from weather or time. It bore no resemblance to what it was destined to become. But I did not see absence—I saw foundation.

The first order of business was simple and absolute: she needed walls.

I searched tirelessly for reclaimed windows, finally finding ones that carried age and presence rather than polish. Her front door was salvaged from a stately antique mansion—a threshold with history already written into it. Every element was chosen deliberately, with no room for excess or hesitation. Every dollar I had went into enclosing her, strengthening her, and giving her the dignity of permanence.

Onlookers were bewildered. The investment appeared disproportionate. The returns unclear. But I was not building for immediacy. I was building for endurance.

That first year, the shop was small—just twelve by nineteen feet. But she was mine. And more importantly, she stayed.

Within that modest footprint, I offered my earliest designs. There were few of them. No abundance, no breadth—only intention. This was the true beginning of Immortelle as an atelier. It was here that I learned the discipline of production: how to source fabric with discernment, how to translate pattern and silhouette into repeatable form, how to communicate vision to others without losing authorship.

It was not glamorous. It was exacting.

This was the year Immortelle learned how to stand on her own.

The garments were still finding their language. The house was still quiet. But the work had roots now. It no longer disappeared at season’s end. It remained. It accumulated knowledge, memory, and consequence.

In 2018, Immortelle did not expand outward.

She deepened.

And though I could not yet see where it would lead, I knew—without doubt—that this was the moment everything became irreversible.

The house had taken root.

— The Immortelle Chronicle continues - 2019