INTERVIEW: Allison Vest
On wrestling boulders, and wielding fabrics.
Hi Toggsers, Hadley here, writing to you from the past.
I’m currently on maternity leave—while I’m gone I’ve replaced myself with creatives, athletes, and mountain town style-phenoms who remind me how fun and big the world of personal expression through clothes, art, and movement really is.
First in this series of climber, artist, and sewing-master Allison Vest.
Allison meet TOGS, Toggsers, meet Allison.
I first met professional boulderer Allison Vest at my final North Face athlete summit—she might just be the kindest human to have a 7+ ape index.
Allison comes alive while bouldering. Her ability to ascend giant stones with just the tips of her fingers and toes is truly, truly impressive. But what I admire most about Allison is her full-hearted embrace of both climbing and fashion. She’s not one to be put in a box, which happens to most athletes who are at the top of their sport. Allison, she’d climb her way out of any confined box you’d put her in. Fashion doesn’t take away from her climbing, and climbing doesn’t take away from her fashion.
In fact, she uses inspiration from both worlds. For the last few years, Allison has been upcycling a lot of her TNF clothes. Refitting and restyling pants and tops to fit her climbing needs and aesthetic. Eventually, that rolled into a partnership with one of the world’s other kindest humans, Euni Figi, who is the Prints and Concepts designer at The North Face. Together, they’ve created signature base-camp duffels for both the athlete team and outdoor consumers.
While ticking off iconic boulders, Allison also started upcycling tents and bags to create one-of-a-kind garments like ball gowns and bouldering togs. There seems to be no fabric she can’t wield, no boulder she can’t wrestle.
So today I’m delighted to introduce you to Allison Vest.
Do you remember an early climbing outfit that you loved?
I was OBSESSED with climbing in bandanas and black flare capris when I was just getting into competitive climbing. SUCH a vibe. That whole look is coming back, so I might need to channel it again 20 years later.
Athletes are often expected to “stay in their lane.” Can you tell me a bit about the process of designing your own clothes and how you expanded your role at The North Face, from just being a climber to a designer too?
It is pretty disheartening that this becomes a universal pressure for a lot of athletes. Climbing to me is an extension of my creativity and the wonder that I have for art. The patience, resilience and attention to detail that are required for climbing bleed into and are felt in similar ways when I’m sewing or carving or exploring artistically.
Being an athlete is obviously physically demanding in ways that make it impossible to be training or thinking about sport all day, every day. I fill my time trying to grow in different spaces and ways that make me a more well-rounded person.
Maybe one day the balance will shift, but for right now, my athletic career is always the priority. Sometimes it takes me months to finish a pair of pants that could’ve taken a day, but that’s the reality of it being a “side hustle”. I think the challenge is that professional athletes are perceived almost exclusively by their social media presence so it’s easy for onlookers to fill in the blanks incorrectly if I post a little more about my art than my climbing for a phase.
I feel so lucky that all the print design work I’ve done with The North Face has unfolded in a way that feels organic and rooted in experience and learning. As far as sewing my own clothing, I am just so grateful to work with a brand that stands behind creativity and multifacetedness and that they’re stoked to support when an athlete comes to them with grand ideas of sewing tiered ball gowns out of tents.
