STYLE AS IDENTITY

Aziza-Abdullah Nicole approaches jewelry as art, investment, memory, and inheritance.

Through her namesake brand, Aziza, she creates fine jewelry, engagement rings and grillz (or what she calls oral sculptures). Her practice brings together gemology, CAD, lost wax, and metalsmithing through a perspective shaped by family, Black culture, and craftsmanship.

In this episode of Style as Identity, we explore why Aziza deliberately pursued such a wide range of training, and how that accumulated knowledge helped her develop her design language, earn clients’ trust, and build the fine-jewelry career she envisioned. She shares how she discerns when a piece calls for exacting precision versus when it benefits from the evidence of the hand.

We also explore the craft and business of oral sculptures: teaching herself to make grillz during the pandemic, designing for the unique “canvas” of each person’s teeth, navigating fittings and materials, and pricing custom work that demands technical skill and coveted design style.

Beyond the jewelry itself, Aziza offers an honest look at what it takes to sustain an independent creative business. We discuss the importance of building multiple revenue streams, why mastering money management is essential to sustaining a creative practice, and how she has built both into her own career.

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Filippo Sorcinelli's work spans sacred vestments, fragrance, music, photography, and art. Yet across every practice, a common thread emerges: creating beauty in service of another person.

Through Atelier Lavs, Filippo has designed sacred vestments for Pope Benedict XVI, Pope Francis, Pope Leo XIV, and clergy around the world. Through UNUM, his fragrance house, he creates scents that move between memory, ritual, sensuality, faith, and personal freedom. Whether expressed through fabric, fragrance, sound, or image, his work is ultimately about helping others feel known.

In this episode of Style as Identity, Filippo Sorcinelli and Lola Catero discuss sacred vestments, Catholicism, personal identity, freedom, contradiction, beauty, and the role of service in creative work. Explore how a practicing Catholic and openly gay artist navigates faith and selfhood, why beauty is experienced through the body before it is understood by the mind, and how creation can become a language for belonging.

Hear about what it’s actually like to design for the Vatican, his approach to designing - and pricing - custom vestments and whether or not he meets directly with the Pope.

Like and subscribe to Style as Identity for conversations with the founders evolving the style-status-quo and building fashion businesses within their vision, values, and vibe.

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"This thing doesn't exist yet, but I already know it matters."

That's what the custom clientele of Studio Maçon are saying when they commission Hannah Woodard to create one of her brass totems. Each object is shaped by both Hannah and the customer's desire for it to come into being, giving it a story before it ever has a form.

In this episode of Style as Identity, Hannah Woodard and Lola Catero discuss emotional functionality, the role of custom work in her business, and what clients seek when commissioning a deeply personal object. We explore how Studio Maçon creates pieces that serve an emotional purpose today while already standing as future heirlooms.

We also discuss the customer insight that helped Studio Maçon achieve 3x returns on paid media, and why understanding what customers are truly buying can transform both product development and marketing.

Like and subscribe to Style as Identity for conversations with the founders evolving the style-status-quo and building fashion businesses within their vision, values, and vibe.

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Melissa Watson Ellis wants women to stop making headlines simply because they wore a suit. Through Watson Ellis, her custom and bespoke suiting atelier, Melissa is changing who gets access to tailored clothing, and what tradition looks like when it expands instead of excludes.

In this episode of Style as Identity, host Lola Catero speaks with Melissa about making custom suiting more accessible, designing a process around the client without compromising the craft, and creating garments that help people feel more fully themselves.

Like and subscribe to Style as Identity for conversations with the founders evolving the style-status-quo and building fashion businesses within their vision, values, and vibe.

Style as Identity is a podcast by @themajoritygroup.

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Who are we? Some of us look to our past as well as our present to answer that question. We spoke to four brands (UnoEth, Nazzal Studios, House of Aama, and Dendezeiro) who are adding to the public archives with creations rooted in history, heritage, identity, and most of all, power. If fashion is a language (and we believe it is), their output is expanding our lexicon of self-expression and our collective understanding of the experiences that ripple across generations and make us who we are. Join us to see how stories are spun into style.

Like and subscribe to join hosts Lola Catero and Frankie Ikwuazom as they meet the founders evolving the style-status-quo. Style as Identity is a podcast by @themajoritygroup.

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Brazilian born-and-blessed brand Dendezeiro represents the lesser acknowledged narratives of Bahia. Through the lens of Hisan Silva and Pedro Batalha exploring their family roots, they use fashion to redefine the narrative of sertão  the dry backlands of Brazil. 

Where some say local fashion is corny or ‘brega’, Hisan and Pedro say it’s chic. Meet Hisan, Hypebeast’s next 100 and Forbes the 30 under 30, to hear how they are flipping the script, and their secret to using social to drive sales, hype and authenticity. 

Like and subscribe to join hosts Lola Catero and Frankie Ikwuazom as they meet the founders evolving the style-status-quo. Style as Identity is a podcast by @themajoritygroup

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Akua Shabaka, along with her mother, Rebecca Henry, established House of Aama in 2015. Akua and her mother are world builders and weavers of visual stories. They create stunning, often ethereal collections like Salt Water, that introduced a fictional Black resort called Camp Aama, and like Sun Records, inspired by Akua’s father’s life. House of Aama is the output of Akua digging into her past (culture, identity, heritage) and sitting in her present. The brand and the pieces become a form of spiritual expression that add to the public archive. Hear how Akua and her mother quickly grew their personal project into an in-demand business. You’ll be as in awe as we were.

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Although Sylwia Nazzal dreamt of one day launching her own brand, her first goal after graduating from Parsons Paris in 2023 was to gain in-house experience. However, no one would hire the Palestinian Jordanian, Arab designer, citing her as talented but too political. 

When they said no, she said yes. Sylwia moved home to Jordan and started Nazzal Studio, debuting her first hit-collection ‘What Should Have Been Home’, a dozen-piece ode to ancestors, honoring of resistance, and urge to reflect on the future. From hijab hoodies to camel shaped shoes, hear how Sylwia creates these heirlooms at first stitch and produces profound pieces placed in closets and museums alike.

Like and subscribe to join hosts Lola Catero and Frankie Ikwuazom as they meet the founders evolving the style-status-quo. Style as Identity is a podcast by @themajoritygroup

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If you’ve ever had a truckload of product catch fire just before it reaches its destination…then you can relate to UnoEth. If you haven’t experienced this feeling, tune into this episode to hear how Xiomara Rosa-Tedla and her dad Dagne Tedla made it through, with help from the strength of their partnerships and vendors.

Their father-daughter business UnoEth (one Ethiopia) offers signature, handcrafted leather bags, totes, backpacks and accessories by reaching back to their roots and partnering with Muzeyen Siraj and his team of artisans in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Find out how they started their brand by accident (read: friends and strangers alike were clamouring for these bags), what lessons Xiomara has learned through working with her Dad, and why building a business alongside trusted community like artisan-partner like Muzeyen Siraj will help you get through flames.

Like and subscribe to join hosts Lola Catero and Frankie Ikwuazom as they meet the founders evolving the style-status-quo. Style as Identity is a podcast by @themajoritygroup

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Innovative products can change our lives. We spoke to four brands (Evelyn & Bobbie, Crave, For Them and CuteCircuit) whose patented products grant us permission to choose ourselves - and not settle for products that don’t. But applying for a patent takes time and money - precious resources for emerging brands. In this Reflections episode, we take what we learned from these guests and form our own opinion. Are patents worth it? Is there a better way for brands to protect their IP? Join us.

Like and subscribe to join hosts Lola Catero and Frankie Ikwuazom as they meet the founders evolving the style-status-quo. Style as Identity is a podcast by @themajoritygroup

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.