The Tamesis
Photo: Cesar Buitrago Mgmt
Aisling Camps took an unusual route to creating her own fashion label. Although she has already won the 2023 Fashion Trust America Award and the 2024 CFDA Fraser Family Foundation Empowering Vision Award, the Trinidad-born designer originally began her career in an entirely different field. She graduated from Columbia University in 2008 with a degree in mechanical engineering with a focus on sustainability. After entering the labor market during the economic crisis, she found a job as an engineer. Although she jokingly calls it a “quarter-life crisis,” she always had the desire to be artistic. This prompted her to take the plunge and enroll in night classes at FIT. After the course she ran into visa issues and returned to Trinidad. Thus, the brand Aisling Camps was born.
In Trinidad, Campos’ pursuit as a knitwear designer faced a new set of challenges. At home, people are not used to conceptualizing classic knitwear in hot weather. Her chosen craft also lacks traditional materials. “I didn’t buy any wool or cashmere. I bought linen and a very tight cotton yarn that was very dry because it was 95 degrees out there every day,” she explained. However, these non-traditional barriers lead to innovation. This mentality is still present in her designs today. The Fall 2026 ready-to-wear collection deftly balances exaggerated, chunky knits with lightweight, layerable pieces like maxi-length vests that wrap around the body in a variety of ways.
Creative thinking and technical know-how certainly help Campos navigate these challenges, and transferring her skills from engineering to disruptive knitwear is much easier than one might think. “I’m just tired of being really good at this craft,” she said. The act of programming a loom felt familiar from her days in engineering. The bots may be slightly different, but much of the language remains the same. In fact, the language was so universal that her intimate knowledge of mechanical principles was invaluable in moving some of her production to Italy.
