Valerian Projects, a fashion and customization brand founded by Rachel Hough, fuses the utility of upholstery fabric, fashion and music festival culture, and will be seen walking the runway at Denver Fashion Week’s Emerging Designer Challenge.
Set to showcase at The Arch on Feb. 3, five emerging designers will showcase a collection to a panel of judges, where two designers will win the opportunity to showcase at the SS24 Denver Fashion Week shows.
READ: Denver Fashion Week Introduces Emerging Designer Challenge Lineup
Originally from Gulf Shores, Alabama, Hough moved to Denver only a few short months after having the epiphany that she was meant to be doing more than just serving and that her driving force was waking up and sewing, while simultaneously finding herself engulfed in festival culture.
“I essentially came up with zero dollars in my bank account, but my target market is out here, and I just really had a feeling that I would take off well, and meet a lot of like minded people,” Hough said. “In Alabama, there’s not many opportunities for artwork to shine through in the way that I make it tailored toward ravers.”
Valerian Projects is an upcycled upholstery brand focusing on festival fashion like decorative mini-skirts, adjustable chokers, reworked parasols, epaulets, pixie sleeves and commissioned custom pieces. The Victorian-esque pieces (defined by her coined term, “whoure couture”) ultimately stem from the designer’s love for making things, but also her desire for unique, high-quality clothing that she just wasn’t seeing elsewhere in stores.
“I knew that I didn’t want the name to end in ‘threads’ or ‘fashion’ or ‘clothing’ or anything like that, even though those are all things that I love,” Hough explained. “I’m not just looking at fabric in the way of wearing it, I’m looking at it as functionality… putting ‘Projects’ at the end keeps it open enough for me to be not so pigeon-holed to one thing and with the way my mind works, I knew I was just wanting to create every day.”
Hough streamlines the design process to be intentional, sustainable and innovative. Take the custom Valerian Project parasols —these are sourced from a small business off Etsy in India that creates the parasols using upcycled bicycle spokes.
From there, Hough reverse engineers the product and customizes it using her materials, all the while still keeping the excess fabric for other projects like stuffing for commissioned pillows. As a creative, she sources fabric from local distributors, most specifically gaining a ton of her textiles from an upholstery shop that was closing down when she first moved to Denver. 
But Hough’s journey only truly started two and a half years ago when she came to Colorado, and what an erratic, emotional journey it has been.
Within the first six months of living in Denver, Hough got a job as an apprentice tailor in Cherry Creek. At the same time, she was applying her sewing knowledge to her own business and was able to take part in her first ever fashion show.
Valerian Projects organically began growing exponentially from there.
The brand influenced by World of Warcraft, Game of Thrones, your grandma’s couch and comic books continued strong with fashion shows. Hough pursued elevating her brand while juxtaposing the struggles of personal conflicts at home with roommates. Just a few weeks after her second fashion show, Hough was laid off from her job. Despite it all, divine timing was seemingly on her side as Valerian Projects continued to expand.
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That is until her Instagram of over 10,000 followers was hacked and deleted.
“My heart sank. It wasn’t just Instagram I started getting emails that someone was trying to get into my Facebook, my email accounts — it was just so chaotic, all within less than 30 minutes,” Hough said. “At the time I don’t think I knew how to handle all of it. Things started getting progressively worse with this new roommate, so it just sent me into a depression that I have never experienced, ever.”
Hough’s passion was built from the ground up into something so significant that she was nearly “taken away from this 9-5 and mundane life” before it swept from underneath her. Hough took the next six months to herself, trying to heal and deleting all social media. But, her resilience and crystal clear passion for art is striking, as her urge for creativity steadily seeped back into her life.
“Slowly realizing that even though it was haunting me, I was still waking up every day and thinking about sewing and making something,” Hough said. “Mental health comes in place with creativity as an artist, because whether it’s a huge pillow or a parasol that’s super meticulous to create, it will still spark some sort of encouragement within you to continue and build back whatever it is you want to make. Essentially, it was day by day.”
Emotionally and spiritually, Hough underwent a seismic shift —her creativity was reawakening. She met her current boyfriend, distanced herself from bad company and focused only on what she could control. Her passion for creating, not only for herself but for others is seemingly cathartic. Her customers themselves inspire her to put integrity and quality work into the things she’s creating.
The longevity of a product is what keeps Hough creating, but she also loves to see how it can brighten someone’s day.
“I hope that the people who wear my skirts or open up a parasol think about the effort that went into making that,” She said. “I want them to feel adorned by the creations that I make because my stuff is flashy and it really is adornment, it is accessorizing, and I think adding a touch of color into your life is everything.”
Over the last year, Valerian Projects has begun posting on social media and proves to be growing in popularity once again. Her humanistic approach and dual perspective of seeing fashion and fabrics for their technicality and beauty allow her to perfect the structure and visual appeal of her pieces.
Hough utilized the networking opportunity with other fashion lovers as a vendor at the Fall 2023 season of DFW and is set to showcase five looks at the upcoming Emerging Designer Challenge.
“I don’t care if it sells or not, that’s not my end goal,” She said. “I just want to create, that’s what makes me happy and that’s what got me to that 10,000 previously and I just want to go back to that moment where I’m feeling that every day — I think I’m finally back to that point.”
All photos courtesy of Valerian Projects
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