Vallozzi Styling in Pittsburgh comes to the wardrobe rescue with closet consulting and personalized shopping services.
Upgrade Your Closet With Vallozzi Styling in Pittsburgh
Anyone who has stood in front of their closet before that big night out or before their dream vacation with the hopes of landing a look that exemplifies their style — and amplifies their assets — faces the problem that Vallozzi Styling exists to solve.
Rachel Vallozzi started her Shadyside studio to lend guidance to those stymied by styling outfits from their own closets or when shopping at today’s dizzying array of online and brick-and-mortar stores. So many choices, yet not enough to wear.
Vallozzi, a Regent Square resident, draws on her own experience in the clothing world. She also builds on the entrepreneurial bent of generations of her family, including her great-grandfather, who was a tailor and furrier.
Growing up, she was allowed to shop from only three sources: thrift stores, yard sales, and Gabriel Brothers, the regional discount retailer. “I’ve always had that hunger for the hunt and learned how to creatively put things together,” she says. “That’s always been my form of self-expression.”
Early Career and Entertainment Industry Beginnings
The studio is a culmination of sorts, following a multifaceted career. As a young woman, Vallozzi tried her hand at acting in Southern California. A member of the Screen Actors Guild, she worked as a stand-in and as a background actor in commercials.
When on set, she came across a job she didn’t know existed: wardrobe stylist.
“I clocked stylists on set,” she says, intrigued to see the styling teams working quickly with racks of clothing to dress the actors.
After a few years in California, she returned to southwestern Pennsylvania, having saved up the residuals from her most lucrative commercial role: a Spanish-language Burger King commercial. Although she’s never seen the ad, those royalties supplied the capital for her first vintage shop.
Thfting Vintage Shops and Retail Experience
“I thrifted for six months and built up a collection” and opened a store, Kharisma Vintage Fashions, in Greensburg. Vallozzi then moved the store to the South Side, then to the North Side, and later, with a partner, opened Pageboy, a shop in Lawrenceville that was a combination boutique and salon.
“I loved opening stores, but I didn’t love running them once they were open,” she says, with a laugh.
In 2006, when The Mysteries of Pittsburgh was filming locally, one of the movie’s costumers visited Vallozzi’s store. As she pulled period pieces from the shop’s inventory, Vallozzi chatted her up about set work, asking about how to get into the business.
Before long, Vallozzi was assisting a local stylist. After he took a full-time job, he began referring former clients to Vallozzi. This launched her career as a set stylist. She has since worked for television, film, and stage productions, including as a costume designer for Quantum Theatre and Barebones Productions. She also takes on brand consultations for professional speakers, real estate agents, and those in the public eye, as well as event styling for weddings, galas, and themed events.
Vallozzi also worked on commercials as the trend of using nonactors was ascendant. As part of the shoot, she would often visit people in their homes and coordinate looks from what they already had in their closets.
The Idea of Closet Consulting
If not a true “eureka moment,” those jobs planted a seed for what is now a signature service at her studio — closet consulting. She helps people find their style by making sense of what they already own.
Vallozzi guided people to see their clothes anew. “Most people only wear a fraction of what’s in their closet,” she says. Items can be paired differently, “or maybe it’s rolling the sleeves or tucking a shirt, or letting it drape on your body a different way.”
Vallozzi also helped clients shop beyond their closets, setting up dressing rooms at stores to make trying on a number of things easier. She would ask, “Is there something in your wardrobe that’s missing? A finishing piece like a jacket or a different silhouette of pant?”
But when the pandemic turned everyone’s life around, she began yearning for a place of her own to do fittings. “I had asked my wife to never let me open a store again,” she says after her boutique experiences. But this would be different: a studio to host her clients for a private fitting experience.
In 2022, in a small storefront on Ellsworth Avenue, she brought her vision to life. Now, clients can come to the private, comfortable space to try on a rack of clothes that Vallozzi and her team — Vallozzi’s wife and studio manager, Danita Greaser, and tailor Jamie Miller — have assembled for them.
Miller’s skills complete the one-stop shop ambition of the studio. “Clients can get their alterations pinned up the same day,” Vallozzi notes.
As a petite woman, Vallozzi knows clothing doesn’t fit all shapes and sizes off the rack. At her company, she embraces the ethos of creating a safe space for all genders and bodies.
Curated Style Systems
The studio sources items from both established and emerging sellers. “A lot of people just don’t have time to find what they need,” Vallozzi says. “The options online have just become more and more, so people are faced with decision fatigue.
“Because of our film background, we’re so used to shopping and returning things that we have systems for that,” she says. “It definitely takes that stress away from the clients.”
The studio helps clients create “seasonal capsule wardrobes,” or a set of pieces that can be mixed and matched into different outfits. Vallozzi sets up a private shopping experience, tailor at the ready — with your own mini-boutique based on your style. Some of their collections have included refined, edgy professional, farmer’s market fresh, tech wear, creative spirit, or European business casual.
Knowing each client is unique, Vallozzi Styling designs cohesive collections for each person’s style journey, Vallozzi says. Capsule wardrobes can also be styled for vacations. Many clients use a capsule as their main wardrobe for a whole season.
“It’s learning who the person is — and how they move about in the world and how they want to present and building out a collection that represents that,” she says. “We’re here to simplify people’s lives and help build confidence and bring joy through self-expression.”
Vallozzi Styling: 5819 Ellsworth Avenue, Shadyside, vallozzistyling.com. By appointment
Story by Jeff Forster