We had the good fortune of connecting with Christina Liedtke and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Christina, what do you attribute your success to?
The most important factor behind the success of the brand is differentiation. Our unique city prints, easy-to-wear styles, and reversibility and/or multifunctionality provides our customers styles that can take them from day-to-night, office-to-dinner, and statement prints that will have them complimented wherever they go.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
Although I own a fashion company and have spent many years designing clothing from custom couture to luxury to contemporary clothing, I equally spent 20+ years in Corporate America working for Beauty Care companies on the strategy side.

The Corporate experience taught me so much about branding, sales, marketing, and finance, while the fashion design experience has taught me a lot about the creative world and pushing the limits in creativity and design.

How I jumped from Corporate America in one sector to owning my own fashion company took years of testing the market, finding a niche that is unique and different, and effectively and efficiently strengthening the 4p’s of business. This took a lot of experimentation, patience, and understanding the most pivotal milestones to reach to scale the business.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
If a friend was going to see me over a weekend, we would definitely hit up the best places to walk/run, shop, and eat & drink.

A typical day would look like the following:
Our day would start with a long walk/run along the Detroit Riverfront and then cut through Dequindre Cut to go shopping in Eastern Market especially on a Saturday for fresh produce and brunch at one of the food trucks or pop-up vendors.

We would then go shopping around Downtown Detroit. Some of my local stores are Faircloth, Peacock Room, and some of the wonderful stores in Midtown Detroit.

We would then grab cocktails and appetizers at Bar Pigalle before grabbing dinner at Oak & Reel with a nightcap to follow at Bad Luck Bar or The Royce Wine Bar.

Other activities would include going to Detroit Institute of Arts and other local galleries as well as other amazing restaurants bars, including Selden Standard, Ima Izakaya, Marrow, Takoi, and She Wolf.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
There are many people and organizations that have been so supportive. I would to provide a shoutout to Jennyfer Crawford from All Things Detroit and All Things Marketplace, Shannon Lazovski from Glamorous Moms Foundation, and several companies in the Detroit community that support local, small businesses like Bedrock and Crain’s.

Website: www.astouri.com

Instagram: @astouri_style

Facebook: www.facebook.com/astouri

Image Credits
Photographer: Giuliano Corriea Model: Ashley Howard Model: Nicole New

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