The pantsuits that got Hillary Clinton's vote
Susanna Chung Forest has carved a niche for herself by dressing powerful businesswomen and socialites in polished, conservative style.
GOOGLE "Hillary Clinton's pantsuits" and the thousands of pages that come up are an amalgamation of gentle mockery, a modicum of flattery and all-out derision. Punch line and rallying cry, those suits have been seared into the public consciousness. (Who can forget the bright tangerine number the former presidential candidate wore on the opening day of the Democratic National Convention last month?)
But lost in the clamor was the designer. Turns out that many of Clinton's signature campaign suits were stitched on the first floor of a boutique in the heart of Beverly Hills by Susanna Chung Forest, who has made a name -- and a sizable business -- for herself by dressing female execs of Fortune 500 companies and Holmby Hills socialites.
In the workshop she runs at the Susanna Beverly Hills boutique, she keeps a photo album stuffed with glossy shots of Clinton in some of the designer's pantsuits, a mannequin made to the senator's measurements and reams of sketches and fabric swatches.
Forest, a native of Korea who has had her Beverly Hills boutique for 32 years, says she first met Clinton last summer at a fundraiser hosted by billionaire Ron Burkle. The designer and the senator were introduced by mutual friends and started talking clothing, and Forest was invited to Clinton's Los Angeles hotel suite to take her measurements.
"She actually has a beautiful shape, very womanly," says Forest, who went on to make a permanent mannequin based on Clinton's body, as she does with all her clients. (This joined a lineup of several she keeps in her atelier, the individual customer's name scrawled on the front with a Sharpie. One mannequin simply boasted the appellation "Sultan" -- as in, "of Brunei.")
After researching the kinds of outfits Clinton had worn in the past, Forest created a few different pantsuits, all in earth shades, and sent them off to the senator's office. The ensembles would become a template: tailored pants, longer jackets that skim the hip, a matching shirt underneath.
"I knew they had to be classic and conservative but also a little fitted, to show her shape, her power." Shortly after, Forest was watching David Letterman's show one night and applauded when Clinton came on, clad in one of the new suits, a flattering mocha number worn with a crisp white shirt.
