From the Editor

World Spirit Fashions is owned and published by Cheryl Bruedigam, publisher of Southwest Flair Magazine and STYLE Santa Fe, former fashion model and beauty consultant.

"Fashion is one of my passions and this magazine is dedicated to unique, spirited, cultural, exotic and high fashion from around the globe. You won't find any cookie-cutter looks or fads here. Style makes the woman." ~ Cheryl B.

Fashion. When other people in my generation talk about having “just missed” the sixties, they are usually referring to Woodstock or free love or acid trips. I, however, on the other hand had missed “Twiggy” yet in my youth that did not stop me. I wore mini skirts and white go-go boots and was laughed out of class in third or fourth grade for my faux leopard-skin coat. By sixth grade some of my classmates had gotten a clue to my newly forming sense of style and elected me to write a fashion column for our tiny school paper. By the next year, as I shot up to nearly five feet eight, they were telling me I should be a model.

About that same year that I got the faux leopard-skin coat, I traveled with my family toNew Mexico for the first time. I saw hippies, artists, Native Americans, musicians and alternative lifestyles, and with alternative lifestyles comes, you guessed it, alternative fashions. I was pretty well sold.

In high school I tried and begged to get to modeling school but my family could not afford it and thought it not a reliable focus for me. I would up attending a “charm” course at (of all places) a Montgomery Wards store. This was of no help. I carried on through high school, some days wearing my strangest garb like a wrap skirt from India with a turban and fringe boots. This was not too widely received in a small Texas horse town. None-the-less, I kept at it. I was determined to be me and to express myself accordingly. I got a job in a mall a clothing store but it bored me out of my mind. I loved the clothes but hated being a sales clerk.

After high school graduation I later married and moved to Hawaii where my cultural fashion senses became extremely heightened. So much beauty and culture to influence the feminine beauty and the clothing to be worn. Brilliant colors everywhere from flowers and lush plant-life burst onto my palette. Wraps, bikinis, colorful dresses, flowered tops, the cutest sandals, and jewelry from the sea, all landed in my closet and drawers.

After Hawaii, I returned to New Mexico for even more cultural fashion influence. During this time I was finally able to attend fashion college. Due to my age, I doubled up on classes and graduated in half the time. The school also had an acting agency so I was already working in fashion before graduation. I was mostly doing tearoom modeling although there were some runway shows as well and the biggie for me was a Bride’s Magazine show inAlbuquerque. I was selected from about two-hundred young women and it was an amazing show. The tearoom modeling was mostly down in Old Town at a restaurant that is still there today. The heavy cultural influences from Old Town added even more flair to my fashion palette. I then joined Mary Kay as a consultant, planning to do before and after glamour shots and work out of the trunk of my car.

After graduation, I returned to the Dallas area while I continued with Mary Kay and signed with Barbizon doing stints at Market Hall. Though I loved the clothes, once again I hated the work. I counted it up and while working at Market Hall, I changed clothes on an average of four-hundred times per day. I let that go. I did some photo work and added to my portfolio. The last thing I did was to enter and become a finalist in the Mrs. D/FW pageant.

By this time I had a child and was working full time in the hospitality industry though I was still with Mary Kay but as work and family life took over fashion and beauty began to slide further and further to the back burner where it remained until 2005 when I began publishing Southwest Flair Magazine.

In between that time I have lived in places like Eugene, Oregon (hippie and bohemian), Santa Fe and its fashion Mecca of influences, Dallas Ft. Worth (where I grew up in the cowboy culture and western world) and Silver City (more hippies and artists), so all of these places I have lived have contributed strongly to my love of unique, cultural and spirited fashions.

World Spirit Fashions is spirited fashions for the spirited woman who is not afraid to let her inner goddess show. Thank you for joining me as together we explore all that the world has to offer our closet! Whether you shop Paris or a thrift store, fashion is about style; your style, Make it stylish, make it spirited, reflect your culture and make it you.