Today we’d like to introduce you to Anna Wiggins.
Hi Anna, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
I founded Loveliest Bridal in 2016, just a couple months after my own wedding. For six years, I was fortunate to style hundreds of brides for their special days. And I absolutely loved it all – purchasing dresses with attention to quality, style, and price; learning about brides, their families, their partners, and their proposals; seeing brides years later and meeting their children when they would come back to shop with a sister, friend, or cousin; and most of all seeing each beautiful bride absolutely light up when she stepped in front of that mirror and felt like the loveliest version of herself. After having a baby, navigating business ownership through a pandemic, and watching my mom’s dementia progress, I made the tough decision to sell Loveliest. I took a couple years of working part-time with other local female-owned businesses and facilitating business courses at Knoxville Entrepreneur Center to figure out what my next venture would be. When I realized I could style women not just for their wedding days, but for everyday, I knew that’s what I was meant to do. After taking personal styling coursework, helping friends with closet edits and personal shopping, and teaching styling, packing, and capsule wardrobe workshops, I’m now taking 1:1 private clients, in person in Knoxville and virtually worldwide.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I’m honestly just getting started with Surseen. Creating, growing, and selling a bridal boutique had its challenges but was mostly an incredibly fun, enjoyable, and rewarding experience. I’m hoping the same is true for personal styling, but I’m finding that I’ll need new strategies to find and connect with my target audience since its not as defined a market as wedding dress shopping.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
Over the past few years I’ve found myself reflecting and writing more. I started a blog that allowed me to share with others about my journey of motherhood, entrepreneurship, being a suicide loss survivor, and caring for my mom with dementia. While my writing is not directly related to fashion or styling, it tells my personal story. With Surseen, my goal is to help others show up authentically as themselves based on their own experiences, lifestyles, goals, and desires. I call myself a Style Linguist, because I help women tell their stories through style before they even utter a word.
If we knew you growing up, how would we have described you?
Oh boy. I was student body president, voted most likely to succeed, and salutatorian of my graduating high school class. I took things seriously – oftentimes too much so. One of my most embarrassing stories is that I “took names” like a teacher at one of my own birthday parties as a child. I will never live that one down. Those perfectionistic expectations still rear their head in adulthood, but much less so. As an entrepreneur, I have had to become comfortable with failure and missteps to continue growing (as a person and a business). As a mom to a daughter, I see her leaning in that perfectionist direction and it makes me want to course correct. We talk A LOT in our house about how we all make mistakes daily, that making them is one of the ways we learn, and that life would be so boring if everyone did everything “perfectly” (whatever that means) all the time. I think this mentality has helped me in my own personal style journey and allows me to assist clients. Style is not about rigid rules but about an understanding of what makes us look and feel our best for any given occasion. Honestly, a big piece of discovering your own style is allowing yourself the time and space to PLAY in your wardrobe. It’s been fun for me to do that with my own and with clients.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.surseen.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/surseenstyle
