The myth of Sisyphus tells of labor without end: a boulder carried to the summit, only to fall again. For women, that boulder has always had a name. Sometimes many.

Sisyphean Ideals of Womanhood began with a question: what does it mean to be an acceptable woman in America? And who decided?

Rooted in American heritage and natural fiber traditions, this collection excavates the visual and material history of American womenswear — its structured silhouettes, its coded domesticity, its handwork — and reframes that history as both constraint and quiet defiance. The women who built this country did it inside extremely narrow definitions of what they were allowed to be. They sewed, shaped, and adorned themselves anyway.

The construction honors that complexity. Smocking, back pleating, and precise tailoring ground each garment in techniques with deep historical roots. Natural fibers insist on material honesty. The result is a collection that looks backward to ask a question that has not stopped being relevant: on whose terms are we building ourselves?