Jenny Vi Dizone, 33, gave up her whole life in Arizona to pursue fashion in New York.
Credit: Sara Johnson
Our Second Shift series features people working more than one job and finding creative ways to make money. This week, meet a woman who left her entire life behind in Arizona to move to New York and pursue her dream of becoming a fashion designer. Want to be featured? Email emily.laurence@metro.us.
Name: Jenny Vi Dizon
Age: 33
Residency: Harlem
Lives with: Two roommates
Number of jobs: Two
Your goal is to focus on your fashion line, and your working as a temp to make ends meet in the meantime.What is your schedule like?
I have a background in accounting, so the temp agency bounces me around between several companies and I do their accounting. The hours are basically 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. I work on my fashion line when I get home from work and on the weekends. … I guess you can say I’m busy! I try to go to bed before 2 a.m. and then I usually wake up around 6:30 a.m.
How is that even possible?
I think you can train your body, to an extent. When I was an accountant, during tax season I would work 60 hours a week, not counting my personal clients, so for four months I consistently only got about three hours of sleep a night. On the weekends I would sleep for eight hours.
Are you trying to get to the point where your can sell your designs on your site?
Yes. I’m getting to that point and have been looking into manufacturing. My strength is sewing because I’ve been doing it since I was 5, but I realized I can’t sew everything myself. I think sewing will be for my super high clients and then the manufacturing will be for retailers.
Are you able to save money from temping or are you just making ends meet?
Right now I’m just making ends meet because my husband is still in Arizona and we are paying two rents. He’s the director of the Food Bank there and is applying for jobs here, but our Arizona lease is up in April, so he may have to move here without a job. He’s been really supportive of me and I realize how lucky I have been in life and in love. We’ve been together for 13 years. It’s actually the main inspiration for my line. I’m calling it Lucky In Love because I feel really lucky.
Go to jennyvi.com to see Dizone’s designers.
Credit: Provided
Follow Emily on Twitter: @EmLaurence
