Faces Of Nantucket: Charlotte Hess

Faces Of Nantucket: Charlotte Hess

Years on the island: 22

Favorite thing about Nantucket: “I just love the ocean early in the morning when the air is crisp, and the fact that we can just walk to the beach or drive and be completely alone. I think I like Nantucket because I'm not afraid to be alone. I'm alone, but I'm not lonely. And there's nothing more I enjoy than being alone in a place so big and beautiful and raw and and getting to have that by myself, even in the summer.”

Charlotte Hess nearly became a steeplechase jockey. She also pursued marine archeology. But the Chicago-born artist and maker ultimately poured her talents into knitwear clothing design. And she has made a name for herself here on the island and beyond.

Hess founded her company Isobel and Cleo - named after her mother and grandmother - on Nantucket as a “slow fashion knitwear brand.” It has taken her all over the country and even across the Atlantic to France. Everything is made in-house with yarn sourced from the U.S., the UK, Italy and Japan. And all of it is made by hand.

“I love working with my hands,” Hess said. “I find it incredibly alluring when people just know how to build and make things with their hands…Not just like carpentry, it's anything. That has this human aspect of it. Anything that feels authentic and genuine.”

After growing up in Chicago, Hess earned undergraduate degrees from Grinnell College and the School of the Art Institute, before leaving the U.S. for the Glasgow School of Art in Scotland, where she earned her master’s of design and textiles.

Back in the U.S., Hess won a competition at the Charleston Fashion Week in South Carolina, launching her career in knitwear and her first trip to Nantucket.

“When I came here I got a little studio and I lived with my extended family,” Hess said. “I got a little studio space. Instead of spending googles and googles on my housing, I got to spend that on studio space in that building behind Ralph Lauren where all those little shops are, called Union Textiles. So I shared that with Cara DeHeart.”

Now years later, with her business well-established, Hess is grateful for the people who helped her with housing during those earlier years, and laments how Nantucket’s housing crisis continues to impact her ability to fully realize the potential of Isobel and Cleo. Hess has travelled to the State House in Boston along with other Nantucket residents to implore lawmakers to take action on the issue.

“I always think about how they gave me my foothold on Nantucket, because if they hadn't provided me with housing - everything comes back to housing - and I’m about to leave because I can't find any right now,” Hess said.

“It is really difficult to run a business here, and what people are doing is they're buying housing. They're buying housing for their employees and their businesses. When you have housing, when you have people, your businesses are going to thrive. But I don't understand - people love to come to this island because it's special and unique. But what is the point in talking about one of my favorite things about Nantucket, if it's not sustainable, right?”

It’s one of the reasons why Hess spends parts of the year off-island now.

“Everyone thinks it's super glamorous that I'm off in Paris or off to San Francisco or off in New York,” she said. “That is all work because what I make here in the summer is not enough for me to live on so I have to continue to work. I'm going to keep doing what I do, which people love - or say they do - but if people want to keep seeing me here, I have to go elsewhere so why not make it France?”