Fort Worth Symbology Clothing Founder is Working to Change the Face of Fashion

Founder and "Creative-in-Chief" Marissa Heyl buys ethically sourced fabrics and uses plus-size, trans, and non-binary models to show the beauty of diversity.

In addition to her fair trade fashion company, Heyl recently opened Etico, a sustainable women’s collective in Fort Worth, where she recruits BIPOC-owned brands.

Marissa Heyl, an anthropologist-turned-fashion maven, aims to “make fair trade sexy.”

CREATIVE
Fair Fashionista
Marissa Heyl

Working with artisans crafting fabrics, primarily in India, she uses fashion to empower women with fair wages and sustained employment. Turned off by the exploitive, superficial tendencies in the fashion industry, she had an “aha moment” while watching a woman create a block-printed tablecloth in a village in India. Heyl, the founder and creative-in-chief of
Symbology Clothing, envisioned that tablecloth as a beautiful dress. A self-described “hippie, nerdy type with a fashion obsession,” she aims to create designs that look good on everyone. A recent Symbology photoshoot celebrated trans, non-binary, and plus-size models with a central message that “diversity is truly beautiful,” she says. Representation in fashion is about “being seen but also changing minds about what’s considered fashionable.”

Heyl also runs Etico, a sustainable women’s collective on Fort Worth’s Magnolia Avenue, where she recruits BIPOC-owned brands.

Meet the Innovator

Dallas Innovates talked with Heyl about ethical fashion and how she is responding to the challenge of social injustice. Here’s what she had to say:

My industry of ethical fashion is overwhelmingly white. I’m working to be an ally in anti-racist initiatives, seeking out deeper discussions about systemic racism and learning how I can create more opportunity and representation through my businesses. I believe open collaboration with women from different backgrounds is key to fighting injustice; plus it’s just an objectively better way to do business. At Etico, I have been actively recruiting BIPOC-owned brands. Currently over half our membership is by women of color, and I plan to increase that in 2021 while hosting more business-building seminars for makers.

We recently had a Symbology photoshoot that celebrated trans, non-binary and plus-size models with a central message: diversity is truly beautiful. Representation in fashion is not just key to being seen but also changing minds about what is considered fashionable.

Founder and “Creative-in-Chief” Marissa Heyl buys ethically sourced fabrics and uses plus-size, trans, and non-binary models to show the beauty of diversity.

Marissa Heyl was featured in Dallas Innovates’ Future 50 in Dallas-Fort Worth in the 2021 edition of our annual magazine.

A version of this story was originally published in Dallas Innovates 2021: The Resilience Issue.

Read it online

Our fourth annual magazine, Dallas Innovates 2021: The Resilience Issue, highlights Dallas-Fort Worth as a hub for innovation. The collective strength of the innovation ecosystem and intellectual capital in Dallas-Fort Worth is a force to be reckoned with.