Where does the title 10AM come from?
All my career, I started work at 10:00 am. As many who work in the art market or do business in the creative world know, this was not a working hour for us, it was our way of life. And since the first day I started planning the brand, I wanted people who think like me and especially those who have adopted this lifestyle or wanted to be in it, to wear this brand. And I think 10:AM describes that very well.
10:AM is a very new brand. How did your fashion adventure begin?
I had a plan to establish a brand that I wanted to reflect my own aesthetic perception for a long time. As I am a fine arts graduate and have been working professionally in the Contemporary Art world for more than 10 years, I wanted to reflect my aesthetic eye and share it with more people. Even though fashion is not a field I am very close to, I thought my aesthetic eye and entrepreneurial spirit would be enough as a start. I can say that I started to reflect this little by little in daily comfortable products.
Did the era we live in have any benefits in terms of comfortable and sporty designs? What was your motivation in establishing such a brand?
Consumer habits, marketing methods and sales channels have changed drastically even in one year since we launched the brand in 2020. We have faced many obstacles to overcome, not just about the corona virus.
That's why we adopted guerrilla marketing strategies instead of traditional ones, which basically meant that we had to be even more creative. And during this period, our comfortable and sports products attracted a lot of attention and all the products in the first collection were sold out.
My three biggest motivations are; freedom of speech-action-content, conscious and fair price policy and of course Sude Alkış.
What details and features do 10AM designs stand out with?
I consider 10AM not as a fashion designer brand, but more as a fashion activism brand. 10AM is a brand that aims to go beyond the act of buying symbolic, fashionable products, pushing ethical consumerism and being more conscious and responsible. We wanted to be a brand that produces designer products accessible to everyone not a brand whose products can only be accessed by privileged people. That's why we try to move forward with a conscious price policy and we sell our products independently through our own website.
I would like to give an example from my own discipline in terms of our priorities on the basis of products. When preparing an exhibition or examining any works of art, we always looked at how it made people feel, what it tried to say, how good the technique was, how controlled or how consciously uncontrolled the technique was, rather than how beautiful it was. Of course, I do not intend to add so much meaning to a sweatshirt or a t-shirt, but this is how I look at any product in textiles, as I do in every job I assume. Their pattern, fabric, stitching, collar depth, what they tell, how they make you feel, and their designs are all indispensable to me.
What kind of a collection did you prepare for the spring/summer season?
Our first two launches were also in mini collection format. We saw that the spirit of 10AM evolved into a more dynamic direction thereafter. From now on, we want to introduce single products more often. We are launching hats for the first time next month, it will be the continuation of the most popular "This is My Game" design of the first collection. Our new t-shirts will be launched in different forms in the summer months. I think we will continue to see sweatshirts and t-shirts for a while at 10AM. We would love to add different products after we achieve the perfection we want in this area.
How is your personal style reflected in the designs?
I am an extremely basic, yet a tough woman. And I like to combine the simplicity with tiny assertive pieces. In all this simplicity, my most indispensable need is comfort, even in a white shirt. Of course, 10AM reflects Seçil Alkış with its hard lines and basic patterns, but we can say that it is more colorful and fun.
Social media is a platform that you know and use very well. To what extent do you think fashion is related to social media?
Yes, we all know how important social media is in today's world. However, social media is just a marketing tool for us. Since Instagram is more popular right now, we all prefer this platform and produce content there, but what matters is what we produce and what we say there. Of course, it is an opportunity not to be missed for brands like us that adopt guerrilla marketing, and the strategies that can be applied are endless. In today's world in which we find it difficult to define freedom, Instagram provides us with a lot of space and of course, it is an indispensable marketing platform for the fashion field as is the case in every field.
 For instance, one of the most critical issues in the fashion world is overstocking locally and globally. We know that the remaining products of certain big brands are burned, and for this reason, the products are offered for sale by adding 20% to the unit prices. We prepared a campaign at 10AM in this regard, that will benefit both ourselves and our members. The aim was to finish all the products in a short time, to provide affordable products to our members, and frankly, we wanted to create a scene.
 All of our products were sold out in just 16 minutes with this very small-scale campaign we launched on Instagram in December. As a result of this campaign, which brought us closer to 10:00AM's world of its own members, we were able to receive feedback from our non-member customers as well, and we created an "Object of Desire" in a very short time. That's exactly what we wanted to do actually! We will continue to have similar projects on Instagram (So don't forget to be a member of 10:00AMJ). We will have plenty of surprises especially for our members in this journey which we have only just begun.
Â
What are your plans or dreams for the future?
10AM will continue to create spaces for content freedom, and be conscious, transparent, fair and sustainable. We believe that it will become a brand that is even stronger with its members by creating a community first locally and then globally while embracing its members and realizing special projects.