How TUAessence started

TUA was born on a life changing trip with 7 more friends to Costa Rica, at the end of 2014. I fell in love with a fishing village in the middle of the jungle, with less than 2,000 inhabitants on the edge of the Pacific, pristine beaches and lush forests, and decided to create a beachwear brand to enable my move there.

2014 was without a doubt one of the most challenging years of my life. For astrology connoisseurs, I was going through my Saturn Return and experienced a turbulent sequence of events. I had started paying for this trip at the beginning of the year, when I couldn't imagine what awaited me (thankfully!) and on December 27th, 2014 when I looked at the sea of Santa Teresa, I felt something inexplicable. I felt happiness, fulfillment and serenity again after a long time. I found myself, I felt at home.

It was on this trip that I met Ju, from São Paulo, tired of working for the pharmaceutical industry. She also fell in love with that little piece of paradise and our destinies were sealed there, at that moment. On the 13th of January, 2015 we left Santa Teresa crying, and on February 8th I was already back, waiting for Ju's arrival, with a suitcase full of bikinis from another friend's brand to try and resell them. We hung bikinis on trees facing the ocean and this was our pop up shop. TUA was born and Ju became my business partner. We returned to Brazil to organize everything and moved back there on 2015/11/11. The doors were opening and things were flowing in a very organic way. The universe seemed to give us the blessing to carry on with this plan that seemed completely crazy to rational thinking.

The choice of TUA's name was also curious. We brainstormed with friends, writing the ideas with markers on the kitchen tiles, and finally another soul sister who was studying numerology had the insight. It was clear that we wanted a name that would translate our pillars of Transformation, Union and Love (Amor)... and voilá: TUA! Essence was a divine download I had to complete and express how these values are part of the brand's DNA and essence. During the first year, we produced natural cosmetics in our kitchen (Ju's specialty) and resold other beachwear brands, but as time went by it didn't make sense for me to sell polyester suits with lining, paddings, fixed tags, etc... Even though at that time I still hadn't fully grasped the impacts and severity of this. In big cities we lose track of the rhythms of Nature, but in a place like this, Her cycles are sovereign. Living immersed in the jungle the notion of my smallness and at the same time part of the whole, of my responsibility and impacts of my choices and actions expanded more and more with each dive, walk and breath. Walking along the beach one morning during the rainy season, the currents coming from Asia brought a lot of garbage. The sand was full of plastic and I took one of them. All letters were in Asian languages. I only understood the expiration date numbers of the product that was once there... 1994! This little plastic that came from somewhere in Asia had been in the ocean for over 20 years and ended up there, on that pristine beach.

It was a moment of epiphany, in which I realized how socio-environmental responsibility, craftmanship, collaborative economy, conscious consumption and a healthy planet go together and one without the other loses strength and meaning. I studied a lot to learn more about the impacts of the fashion industry and textile technology and I committed myself to making a clean, respectful, fair, empathetic and inclusive fashion. In 2018, Ju left TUA and went on her beautiful solo flight with cosmetics and I continued with the production of conscious fashion at TUAessence. I lived for almost 4 years in Costa Rica and this journey brought me gifts that I don't even know how to explain. From famous clients like Gisele Bündchen, to clients who became friends, friends that became sisters... and with this commitment to ethics, care, art, intuition, rituals and ancestral knowledge, and especially to nature, I Fernanda continue to be the change I want to see in the world. Will you join me? Want to know more about TUA? Go to: https://en.tuaessence.com/tua