Hey! Have You Tried Hauteline?
I talked to Kristie and Michelle of Hauteline about making fashion gentler on the planet, spotlighting new voices, and the joy of dressing as an act of self-reinvention.
Hauteline isn’t just a rental platform; it’s an invitation to discover a new way of being. With careful curation and shared wardrobes, it builds a community where borrowing becomes an act of connection and care.
K: I started Hauteline a little before Michelle joined. I’ve always been interested in sustainability and knew I wanted to start something of my own. I just needed the right idea. When I moved to New York, I was a software engineer at Microsoft, but felt stuck and really wanted to work in fashion. I started taking night classes at FIT to bring something creative into my life.
Eventually, I moved to Farfetch as a software engineer, which felt like a better segue into fashion. I worked under their sneaker resale arm, which was sort of circular fashion, though it was all-new sneakers. This was during the big hype era for sneaker drops, so I got exposed to circular marketplaces and learned a lot about how e-commerce works.
During that time, I also started exploring brands I loved and finally had a reason to dress up, but quickly realized I couldn’t afford most of what I wanted. There was always this gap between my taste and my budget. That pushed me to think about solving this problem in a way that aligned with my passion for sustainability (I even started an environmental club in high school).
I landed on clothing rental because it felt like a tangible way to promote reuse. We started with one rack of clothes sourced from Ssense, The RealReal, and wherever we could find great pieces, and put them online for rent in fall 2023. We tested the market to see if there was demand for a more downtown, emerging designer rental platform.
After a few months, we opened a small showroom in Brooklyn and needed help. Through a mutual friend, Karina, I met Michelle. She started as a contract employee, but immediately clicked. She picked everything up so quickly and was just as invested as I was from day one. That’s rare; usually, you find misalignment in energy or vision. But with Michelle, it was clear right away.
That’s how we started building Hauteline together.
M: I had just moved to New York about six months before I joined. I’d quit my job in banking in SF and came out here on my own little Eat, Pray, Love journey. I was walking dogs, working at a vintage store, just kind of glamorizing doing nothing in the dead of winter.
But I knew I wanted to work in an industry I actually cared about, which for me was fashion. I just didn’t know how to break in since my background was so different, so I figured I had to start from the bottom up.
Through Karina, I heard Kristie was looking for someone to help with showroom appointments. It felt like an extension of a retail job, and at the time, I was juggling five different gigs — this was just another one. I really didn’t think it would turn into what it has, but I was so into the idea from the start.
I’d constantly suggest things, like “Hey, maybe we could do this” or “We should try that.” I wasn’t thinking, “I’m going to help run this company one day,” I just genuinely enjoyed working on it and saw real potential.
With my background in finance and hers in tech, it felt really synergistic, and from there, my responsibilities just naturally grew.
On Opening the Fashion Gate
M: I feel like I've always been interested in fashion, but to me, it was a very gated-kept industry. I thought you had to have a famous parent or have really worked your way up from a sweaty, unpaid internship for multiple summers. And I didn't think it was accessible, and I just thought doing the more traditional corporate path was more realistic.
K: Honestly, I dressed really badly in college. It wasn’t until I moved to New York that I started to feel like, oh, this is actually something I could do. I never even considered it a real job for me personally.
I just took a job that made sense at the time, but New York really opened my eyes to dressing for yourself, dressing with adventure and experimentation in mind. Those ideas definitely influence how we curate at Hauteline. It was all super eye-opening for me.
M: Social media was huge, too. I started making fashion TikToks during COVID, and in that era, fashion really shifted. Everyone went from having the same kind of style to valuing individuality, self-expression, and play. It honestly felt like a fashion renaissance.
K: Yeah, I remember in early 2020, you’d open TikTok and see someone playing with pieces they already had in their closet, and it would be incredible. You’d think, how did you even put that together?
On Rethinking the Rental Wardrobe
K: There’s a huge gap in the rental market, and we’re working hard to fill it. Vintage and secondhand feel super saturated. There are so many curated vintage stores and platforms. We both love shopping vintage, but when it comes to clothing rental, everything felt either super commercial (like endless pages of Nordstrom-like dresses) or very “prom dress”, sparkly ball gowns, that kind of vibe.
There wasn’t really anything for the downtown New York girl. Someone who wants to try smaller designers, pieces from around the world, or one-of-one custom pieces. To my knowledge, that didn’t exist before Hauteline, and I think our customers would agree it was something New York really needed.
M: I feel like in the rental market, a lot of emerging companies avoid one-off rentals and instead go for subscription models, where you rent everyday items, like a winter coat for a month. It feels very mass-produced and focused on basics, or, on the flip side, very occasion-specific, like big event dresses.
There isn’t really a spectrum. It’s either everyday wear or full-on occasion wear. I think Hauteline sits right in between. It attracts people who want a cool, trendy everyday wardrobe but also need something special for an occasion.
K: It’s very much a natural process. People usually come to us when they want to turn a look — that’s how they first get into Hauteline. Then, as they “graduate,” they move beyond just hot wedding guest dresses and start renting party looks and more everyday statement pieces.
On Becoming a Tastemaker
K: I think a tastemaker is anyone with influence. That could be a celebrity or influencer, but it could also be someone with a private Instagram and 800 followers who’s the most stylish, iconic person in their friend group.
It’s the person everyone texts asking, “What are we wearing tonight?”, the one setting the tone, even if it’s just for three people. You don’t have to be famous; you just need a strong vision for who you are and how you present yourself.
So while “curated rentals for tastemakers” can sound pretentious, to me it just means someone who inspires their friends and family, or even just themselves.
M: Yes, to me, a tastemaker is someone with a strong sense of personal style. It can be super broad. Someone with an alternative style, a more girly style, whatever it is, as long as they’re secure in what they like.
It’s important to us to have something for everyone: pieces for the edgy girl, the girly girl, and everyone in between. We’re really tailoring to every kind of tastemaker and all the different styles they represent.
K: This actually surprised us too, but the Hauteline customer really ranges from a 15-year-old going to prom to a 41-year-old who's over buying a new dress for every wedding. There’s truly room for everyone.
M: Even if someone doesn’t have a strong sense of personal style, there’s always something that will catch their eye. Even if you don’t know your exact aesthetic, some pieces just speak to you.
K: That’s part of our job in curation — to feed you thoughtful ideas and inspiration.
M: It’s the kind of stuff you wouldn’t normally pick out in a store, but you can’t stop looking at it, and it ends up looking amazing when you try it on.
On Curating with Care
M: We’re both super chronically online and always adding people to our running list. If we see a designer doing something different or showing extreme craftsmanship, it totally catches our eye.
K: No fast fashion. That’s a big one for us. And another unspoken rule is: would we wear this ourselves? If not, why ask someone else to? That’s a big part of our curation. So far, whatever we genuinely love has worked, so we just stick with that vibe.
M: Some boxes are about aesthetic and design, but others are specific to rental, like whether the material launders well and lasts through multiple wears, or if the style can fit different body types and look good on everyone.
K: Exactly. Does it have adjustable straps or an adjustable back? Can it fit lots of different body shapes? Those practical things really matter to us.
On a bigger level, we also love supporting young, emerging designers. It’s harder than ever to stand out today — the market is so saturated and competitive, and young consumers are used to fast fashion prices, so they don’t always understand the true cost of a unique, well-made garment.
Supporting this ecosystem is really important to us, especially in New York. That’s why we highlight designers like Caroline Zimbalist and Grace Gui. With rental, we can bring down the price barrier — an $800 dress becomes $100 to try, making it accessible to someone who might never have considered it otherwise.
On Curating Through Partnership
M: It started with us just buying pieces ourselves. But over time, we’ve shifted to only stocking brands we have partnerships with. There are still a few leftover pieces from that early era, but now we mostly work with brands on a wholesale or consignment basis — it’s a mix.
K: For brands that do more one-of-one samples or unique pieces, we work on a commission basis. They give us the inventory they have, and we split the rental profits from each piece.
On Supporting Sustainability
K: This system isn’t just sustainable for the environment and fashion, but also for young designers. Without renting out samples or extra stock, it can be really hard for them to survive financially in a city like New York.
We’ve also heard from designers that with styling pulls, stylists usually expect free merchandise. So they’re excited they can actually make money now instead of constantly giving away valuable inventory for free, which is just one of the many ways the fashion industry exploits young talent.
On Sustainability As The Foundation
K: Sustainability was a core reason we started Hauteline in the first place. But on a practical level, Michelle and I can 100% say it’s way harder to run a sustainable business than a regular one. Bringing items back, cleaning, repairing, making sure they’re in perfect condition and in stock — it’s all super operationally challenging.
If we didn’t truly care about sustainability, we wouldn’t do it. It would be so much easier to just order clothes, sell them, and move on.
One of our original ideas was to help designers make money off pieces without producing new stuff. Our commission partnerships really support that, designers can still profit from something they made six or twelve months ago, which is almost unheard of in fashion.
It’s definitely still challenging: things get damaged or lost, and we’re always figuring it out. But we really care, and it’s part of our DNA. It’s just built in at this point.
On Renting Instead of Regretting
M: I’ve definitely had that hesitation myself — like, why rent when I could just buy something? Why spend the same amount when I could get an $80 cheap piece?
But in New York, especially, space and time are more valuable than anything. The time it takes to go try things on at Aritzia versus browsing a curated list of birthday dresses we’ve already picked out is huge.
Plus, closet space. Do I really want to add another dress? I’ll just feel guilty about it every time I see it. Or would I rather have something I truly love for that one weekend, feel amazing in it, and not have it hanging there haunting me afterward?
On Foundations and Flourishes
M: As you mature, personal style starts to mean more, and the pieces you own become things you truly love — those capsule wardrobe staples you’d take to the grave.
Once you have that core closet set, you can use rental platforms for special occasion pieces to spruce things up.
That’s the ideal mix, in my opinion: your everyday closet, plus something like Hauteline for those standout moments.
On Borrowing as Bonding
K: Because we work directly with designers and literally share clothing, there’s a unique sense of togetherness built into our model. People are actually wearing the exact same dress, sometimes dozens of women sharing one piece. That’s wild! No other retail experience really does that.
This idea of sharing, not over-consuming, and collectively valuing a piece you spend your hard-earned money on is core to our business.
Sometimes I still can’t believe it’s real, like this past weekend, seeing our community show up for our opening event and leave the sweetest comments. It’s amazing to realize there are real people who deeply believe in this, and it honestly blows me away.
M: At first, Hauteline might just feel like a service. But as you interact more — see our sometimes cringeworthy TikToks and engage with the brand — people get more and more invested.
K: It kind of feels like shopping out of your cool big sister’s closet, like snooping around and borrowing pieces. That idea really warms my heart.
We make content of ourselves in the clothes, which helps create a connection with our audience. People sometimes tease us for modeling, but honestly, who else would do it?
Overall, we’re so excited by how many people have embraced the idea and are cheering us on. It still feels so new — a year and a half isn’t that long in the big picture — but we’re excited to keep growing from here.
On Letting Love Lead Growth
M: Our entire growth strategy is pretty much organic. We make content for our own socials and work with influencers who reach out or are friends and mutuals. We did try ads briefly but couldn’t really figure them out, so we just stuck to what felt authentic.
Zero paid ads, which feels pretty unique these days when every brand is pouring millions into marketing. To me, that really proves the strength of the concept — if you don’t need to spend money and people still come, that says everything.
K: It helps us connect with our community too. Seeing customers tag us and genuinely feel proud to wear Hauteline always warms our hearts.
It’s so fun to watch that word-of-mouth grow naturally, and we love reposting them to show that mutual love. It sounds kind of wild since we’ve never met most of them in real life, but then you see someone in Arizona or Maine or Texas wearing Hauteline.
M: You’ll see an order from Nebraska, and it’s just a name, then a week later, you get to put a face to it.
K: It’s so cool that we get to be part of people’s special moments — their bachelorettes, birthdays, weddings, bridal showers, graduations, all these big milestones. Without social media, we wouldn’t get to see that.
It also helps our curation because we learn what people are shopping for — prom, graduation, mother-of-the-bride vibes — and get constant feedback through social.
You have companies spending millions on customer research to figure out what people want. We get that for free because our customers are so cute and love posting on their stories.
On Serving Before Scaling
K: We’re really locked into our girl, our niche, and our curation, so no new categories for now.
Right now, we’re focused on making this 10 times better. There are still kinks to work out and more types of customers we could serve better.
We’re super happy with where we are — probably a bit beyond proof of concept at this point — but not yet a perfectly oiled machine.
Right now, we just want to keep our customers happy and excited, and focus on serving them even better before we think about anything else.
M: Yeah, I agree. The stuff we’re working on now is mostly behind the scenes, things no one else can see. For us, it’s the operational challenges, especially as we scale. Getting all of that in order will make a huge difference.
K: It’ll make everyone’s life better.
As for clothing, we’re really excited about introducing vintage. We’ve started bringing in vintage purses from Hachi Archive, a New York–based store we partner with to rent out amazing designer bags. We also work with Select Vintage for ready-to-wear and some incredible one-of-one gowns.
There’s so much potential here since New York has so many special vintage pieces that might be too pricey to justify for just one night. We see a real synergy with the vintage community, and it’s definitely a direction we want to keep growing and evolving over time.
On That Full-Circle Feeling
M: Last Thursday, during our opening, we were working up to the very last second — our friend Sean was literally drilling things onto the walls right before.
K: It was really like five minutes before guests arrived. Even with a few early guests, we were still saying, “Oh, you can wait right here, just give us 10 minutes!”
M: It didn’t really sink in until that moment when the hammers and drills were finally down, and we could actually look around. Guests started arriving, the space was full, and it felt so surreal. It still hasn’t fully hit, but in that moment, it was like, wow, we actually did it. The whole week before, we were wondering if it was even possible.
K: There was a lot of doubt leading up to it, for sure.
For me, though, the proudest moment was when we started getting orders from random parts of the country. Like, seeing an order from Delaware and thinking, how do they even know about us? That was the moment I realized this had grown into something bigger than just me and my supportive friends — it had a life of its own.
M: A couple of months ago, someone ordered a dress from my hometown zip code in California. I didn’t even know them, and it was such a “whoa” moment, it was super surreal to see it reach back home.
Follow Hautline on TikTok and Instagram, and if you’re in New York, visit their gorgeous new store at 95 Orchard St1
This interview has been edited & condensed for clarity.