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Since my arrival back in Stockholm earlier this year there is one person I have bumped into more frequently than others – stylist Jessica Mittelton. She just seems to be everywhere and always with a big smile and some nice words. I decided to sit down for a proper chat and to find out more about this big smiley.

“I love the visual expression”, is the first thing Jessica says when we meet over a drink. “In any shape or form, colors, silhouettes, or profiles”, she continues.

Jessica Mittelton Jessica’s story starts when she was 16 and decided to go for her own style. “I pretty much tried anything that I liked and was looked upon as crazy”, she says. That and her love of theatre made her move abroad after school at the age of 18. “I never thought I would come back”, Jessica says.

After floating around in life and at different theatre schools in London and New York for a couple of years she did start thinking of returning home though. “I had always been interested in fashion and suddenly this interest took over”, she explains. “I thought it would be good to go home and develop that part of myself; to be able to focus 100%. I was only planning on staying for six months”, she continues.

She came back and was convinced by a friend to start working for H&M as a buyer. The company was a good school – she stayed for five years! At the same time as she was working for H&M she also studied at Beckmans School of Design in Stockholm.

After these five years she had just had enough of fashion for a while and it was time for a break and instead she started studying marketing and communication at Bergs and social psychology at Stockholm University. “These educations together with my earlier experience is what really made me into what I am today, a person with one foot in the creative world and the other in business”, she says. “It makes it possible for me to help not only with the creative part, but also with the business side”, Jessica continues.

With all this education and experience in the luggage she started working as a stylist in 2002. At the time she didn’t really have a network in the Swedish (though a big one overseas) industry but slowly built that to get more and more jobs. A reason for the success is probably the way she works. “I love to work with, and help, people and I always make sure to get to know them and that helps immensely”, she explains. “I simply love to help my clients succeed”.

Colorful flowers to the left and right.

Jessica sure is a free spirit and therefore she has deliberately focused to work with other things than editorial work. Instead she has focused on working with artists and music videos. “There are too many limits when you do editorial work and I like to use all my creativity and knowledge”, she says.

With all the years of experience Jessica finally feels that she can really go for it. Earlier she has always felt the need to restrain herself. “Swedes are a bit of “safetyholics” and it is hard for them to understand that a person that is crazy and creative also have the ability to be business minded”, she says. “I finally feel that I have come to a point where I can stop censoring myself”, she explains and with this it is time for us finish the interview before she rushes off like a red flower in the Stockholm concrete.