Name Interview: Ginger Burr

I confess, sometimes I’ve watched fashion make-overs on TV or seen them in magazines and I’ve secretly wished I could be one of those people.

The problem is, I worry that would mean giving up my comfy yoga pants and t-shirts. I usually console my disheveled self by saying looks shouldn’t matter anyway. It’s what’s on the inside that counts, right? I mean, what was it that our moms always told us? “You can’t judge a book by its cover.”

Then I try to remember the last time I didn’t judge a book by its cover.

The thing is, looks do matter.  Dr. Gordon Patzer, Dean of the College of Business Administration at Roosevelt University has spent over 30 years studying attractiveness. He says in an article on MSNBC that, “we are just hard wired to respond more favorably to attractive people. This is something anthropologically that has existed for as long as history exists.”

What are we to do? Do we have to sacrifice comfort for beauty? I think I’ve found the answer to this question and her name is Ginger Burr. Ginger is an image consultant whose credo is simple: that a dynamic personal and professional image could be created without having to relinquish personal style or comfort.

She sounds like my kind of person!

I talked with Ginger recently about her name, but the topic of fashion came up a time or two as well.

I was under the impression that most image consultants are people who in their youth could throw together a paisley scarf, striped tights, and a hounds tooth skirt and somehow make it sing! Come to find out, Ginger wasn’t like this at all. In fact, she fumbled around with clumsy fashion trends until she was in her 30’s. That’s when she finally started to understand her own personal style. As a result she appreciates the need for each person to find their own authenticity rather than having someone else’s style forced on them.

Ginger’s skill with fashion grew over time and as a result she started her own company, Total Image Consultants. She’s been acknowledged in The Boston Globe, Women’s Health Magazine, Worth Magazine, VegNews Magazine, Elegant Wedding Magazine, CNN.com, ABCNews.com, Fox TV News and WHDH Television’s Chronicle.

One of my favorite tidbits about Ginger is that she was selected as one of VegNews Magazine’s “25 Most Fascinating Vegetarians” in 2007 because in addition to being a fashionista, Ginger is also vegan. That means she can offer “guidance, support and insight to her vegan (or just curious and open-minded) clients showing them how to dress fashionably and still be true to their values.”

If you’re curious about vegan fashion, what it means to find your own authentic personal style, or how someone with gorgeous red hair was named Ginger, you’ve come to the right place. Don’t worry if you’re lounging around in your yoga pants and baggy t-shirt. I won’t tell anyone!

Marly’s Name Interview with Ginger Burr

What did your parents name you when you were born?

They named me Virginia. I was named after the woman who introduced my parents. My parents planned to call me Ginny as a nickname. One of my father’s requirements in a name was that we all have nicknames from our birth names so I was going to be Ginny until I was born with red hair. Then I became Ginger.

So they picked your name based on your hair color?

Yes, yes. They looked at me and said, “Red hair? Oh my goodness, she has to be Ginger.” And so that was it. I was Ginger from the moment I was born.

I was going to ask if you had heard of this trend of calling people with red hair Ginger.

It’s funny, you know, I think it’s because ginger root has that sort of color. I often have people who tell me that my name is so perfect for my hair. People remember me, generally, which is kind of nice.

Did you like your name as a child?

I’ve always liked my name. Well, wait a minute. If we’re talking about the name Ginger, then yes. Virginia is a fine name, but I don’t relate to it all that much. Mostly because I only hear the name Virginia when my mother’s mad at me or the IRS is calling. I don’t think about that name too much. I’ve always gone by Ginger and as a result I’ve always liked my name.

I mean, when I was growing up, Gilligan’s Island was very popular. And of course, Ginger was the movie star so how could you not like that name! She was on a deserted island wearing new ball gowns every day. Perfect makeup. I don’t know how she did it. It was totally absurd, but it was great fun to watch.

So what do you think of your name now as an adult?

I did go through a phase when I first started my business where I questioned my name. I wondered if Ginger was a serious name for a businesswoman. I wondered if I should change and go by Virginia. That lasted about 10 minutes. And then I thought to myself, “I’ve always been a Ginger. Everyone knows me as a Ginger. There aren’t that many Gingers out, particularly those with red hair.” So I decided to keep using Ginger.

I even like my name as I get older too. It’s funny because I saw my mom last week and I told her I was going to do this interview with you about my name and she said she remembered when she told people my name that they would caution her that Ginger may not be a good lifetime name. They asked her to think about that little girl when she’s 80 years old. Will she still want to be Ginger? Or will she want something more fitting of an 80-year-old, like Virginia.

As I was listening to my mom I thought, “No, I think I’m Ginger until I’m 110 and that’s just the way it is.” And I will have red hair until then too.

That’s great! I love it! The name and the hair are keepers.

Yes. I had a friend who was born with red hair — she was much older than me — she died at 102. And she died with red hair. I thought to myself then that I want to be just like Naomi. I’m going to be a redhead when I’m 102.

I think you have to feel good about who you are and the name that you’re using. How you relate to your name is important. Names are so powerful!

It’s important to keep ourselves in sync with who we are both physically and mentally. If we’re youthful in spirit it’s good to have our exterior reflect that as well.

I agree. I watched my grandmother go gray and she was originally red headed too. I hope I don’t get any redheads mad out there, but when red heads go gray, it’s sort of a funny yellow, dreary color. It’s not a wonderful salt and pepper color. So my sister and I both looked at each other as teenagers and agreed that we would not do that. I admire gray hair on people who can really pull it off. My gray hair, and it’s under there, would not have been beautiful. Let’s put it this way, I would not have felt beautiful, thus it stays red.

That’s really important – to define for yourself what is beautiful.

Yes it is. It’s the kind of work I do. It’s what I teach people.

What do you think of people who change their name?

I think everybody should love their name. I know plenty of people who have either changed their name or changed to some derivative of their name. I think you have to feel good about who you are and the name that you’re using. How you relate to your name is important. Names are so powerful!

I’ve had some people tell me that names are superficial. They think it’s silly to worry about a name. What’s your response to a comment like that?

Well, it’s certainly their prerogative not to change their name. We all get to do what makes us feel the best. As long as we’re not hurting anyone else and it gives us a sense of joy or pride or feeling special, then I say go for it. What harm does it do to anyone else? So they have to learn to call us something differently.

I have a friend who changed her name significantly. Her new name was not even related to what it was before. I made a very conscious effort to be aware of that because I wanted to honor her and what her wishes were. I think you should get to do what you want and other people should get to do what they want and leave you alone.

I read one of your quotes about how you’ve cherished opportunities for personal exploration because they’ve led you to where you are now. How did these opportunities lead you to find your own personal style?

I grew up in a small town and back in the 60’s and 70’s fashion was considered to be a bit bizarre. I didn’t have a lot of ways to learn about what really interested me. I was in my 20’s before I really began exploring in a way that led me to where I am now. I was looking and searching for what made me feel like me. It wasn’t until I met Nevena, the woman who eventually became my mentor, that I knew what I wanted to do with my life. That’s also finally where I figured out how I wanted to dress. I want every woman to feel wonderful about how she looks. I don’t care so much about making sure that you are fitting in or conforming.

Besides, you’ll drive yourself crazy trying to fit in with everything that’s out there. What’s more important is when you feel really good about how you look and you’ve done it intentionally, not just by default.

Is it difficult to help clients if they don’t really know what they want as a style?

Some people don’t know what they want but they usually know what they don’t want. We can always start there. I have a home study program called, “Who Taught You How to Dress?” and one of the sections is called, “Are you in the right job for your clothes?” I included this because so many people are wearing clothes eight, ten or twelve hours a day that they absolutely hate because their job requires it. I sometimes suggest that maybe they could use their skills in another way and get a job that allows them to dress in a way that they feel really fabulous. I think each one of us deserves to explore and find out who we are and then look at how we want to present ourselves to the world.

When we encourage others we can help them feel good and be able to step out of their comfort zone into a new way of expressing themselves.

How should we respond to people who react negatively to our new ventures in life, whether it’s changing a name, discontinuing a nickname, or a new wardrobe?

In my home study program there’s a section called, “Hurtful Comments and Unwanted Advice.” There are so many people who feel that somehow they have permission to say to somebody, “I don’t like your name. Why’d you change it?” or “I don’t like your hair. Why are you wearing it like that? It always looks messy.” “How come you dress so differently” or “Your hips are too big.” Whatever it is. These things make women feel bad about themselves.

But there’s another way of empowering people. When we encourage others we can help them feel good and be able to step out of their comfort zone into a new way of expressing themselves.

It seems our internal dialog is really important and I saw on your site that you work with your clients to do affirmations?

Yes, to help them to begin to put some of those hurtful comments behind them. Some comments from our past can really get a hold on us. There are lots of ways that people can begin to move beyond some of these feelings that they’ve been holding securely inside them that have kept them feeling kind of small. Or kept them from really recognizing their beauty and their power and so I have found affirmations are one way of doing it. And just sometimes with the type of work that I do, just learning to dress in a different type of way helps as well.

Change can be really scary. Is it difficult for people to learn to dress differently?

Yes, but that’s why we take it one step at a time.  Many of my clients will get excited, but also a little uncomfortable because they’ve been entrenched in their comfort zones. If I have a client like that I just remind her that this is more about exploration. It’s about making sure that the image you project is really the one that you mean to project about yourself through the clothes and choices that you make. I don’t tell people they have to dress a certain way. I might say to a client, “OK, you like purple and you like floral, so let’s see how we can combine those in a way with a certain kind of neckline and make it work for you.” Everyone is really very different and that’s what’s so fun about what I do. Even if two people have the same body type and the same coloring, their personalities are very different so they may choose completely different clothing styles. It’s fun to see that come to fruition.

Would you say that you’re helping your clients to be more authentic?

Oh, absolutely. Yes.

I think that’s what I really connect with when I read about you. You’re not about making someone fit into some certain fashion mold, but more about helping them be who they really want to be.

And so many women aren’t and that’s only because they don’t know how.  And they’re frustrated, particularly, because the fashion industry caters to the young, the thin. Anyone over 35 or 40 or who maybe has a little bit of extra weight on them or is not perfectly balanced in their bodies, they’re left by the wayside. It’s as if the fashion world is saying, “OK, you’re on your own. Fend for yourself. Figure this out.” And there’s no guidance, and so they then begin to dress by default in the sort of over-sized clothing or things that just don’t suit them but just feel safe or familiar. I’m there to guide them and help them explore and find other options that make them feel good but that are equally comfortable and flattering and that speaks to who they are at a gut level.

I saw that you were named in VegNews Magazine as one of the most fascinating vegetarians.

Yes, I know. Isn’t that so wild!

It’s very cool! They described you as a vegan image consultant. Do you cater a lot to vegans?

It’s a growing population. I see what I do as being available to help educate people who have a curiosity and want to understand the amount of suffering that goes into the fashion industry, including the hair care products we use. And actually it’s interesting, because a lot of people have no idea where their leather shoes come from and why they might not want to wear merino wool. We don’t often think about these kinds of things. We think about the quality of something or we think about the fit or the color or the price. But we don’t think about where it actually originated. When I became a vegan I became painfully aware of the amount of suffering that’s out there in the name of fashion. Well, actually in the name of a lot of things, but because I’m an image consultant, I think about it from the fashion perspective. I decided I would show that you can be fashionable and still be compassionate and cruelty-free in your clothing choices.

I don’t know if you know this, but I’m also a vegan and usually people sound surprised that veganism is also about clothing (including leather purses).

Oh, absolutely. It’s absolutely beautiful what’s out there now. And no one would know that they’re not leather. But there are still those people who think unless it’s leather it can’t be good quality. And so it’s just about educating people and enlightening them. I don’t even bother with the people who have no interest because it’s just useless and you’ll ending up tearing your hair out.

But for people who say, “Oooh, I didn’t know that, tell me more,” that’s where I put my energy. Not all of my clients are vegan by any stretch of the imagination. If they don’t bring it up, I don’t mention it. My focus, if you look at my newsletter, includes examples of fashion trends for the season and they will always be vegan.

How did you decide to turn this passion for fashion into a business?

I was almost 30 when I started my business. I had been a music major in college and I had worked in the arts for a little while, but was starving so I was also temping at night to make ends meet. I ended up working for a professor at MIT. One day I realized I had been there almost five years and it wasn’t what I want to do with my life.

This realization kind of coincided with me meeting Nevena, the woman who eventually became my mentor. She offered a seminar in Boston. I knew within an hour of being at her seminar that this was what I wanted to do. I continued working part-time while I built up my business.

I’ve read that it’s important to always look your best. Is that true?

I think it is true but I think when people hear that they think feel alarmed because they know they don’t want to dress in their best clothes all the time. “ And it’s really not about that. It’s about feeling good about how you look. Lately I’ve been telling a lot of people about Glima t-shirts. They’re fabulous t-shirts. They’re pretty and often with a v-neck, and they’re designed for a woman’s body. You can go to the park with your children, run to the grocery store, whatever you want. You put them on with a nice pair of jeans and some pretty sandals or sneakers, and go about doing whatever you’re out running around doing. You can have a coordinated outfit that’s comfortable and casual and still look pulled together and still look you’re best given the situation. So I think your best is defined as wearing something that you feel good about. A lot of women think, “Oh my goodness, I have to give up comfort in order to do this” and you don’t. Not at all.

We use words like beautiful to describe women, but it can mean so much more than physical attractiveness. It can also mean strength and character too.

It’s interesting that you say that. I do this workshop that I call Aligning Your Inner and Outer Beauty. It’s about looking at who you are on this inside and applying words to that inner essence. It’s interesting how many women in the seminar are very reticent to choose words like lovely or pretty or attractive to describe themselves. I think that’s because a lot of us have been brought up to believe that we’re not attractive or if we think we are we should play it down because we’ll be too full of ourselves. It’s wonderful that we all find different ways to express that. Otherwise, we’d all want to marry the same person and that would be terrible.

There’s beauty in every thing and beauty in every person. Personal style is about finding out what feels beautiful to you.

Women are more harsh critics of themselves than they should be. There’s more than one definition of beautiful.

Even though the magazines and fashion gurus will try to tell you otherwise, there is more than one definition of what is beautiful. There’s beauty in every thing and beauty in every person. Personal style is about finding out what feels beautiful to you. It’s not so much me saying, “Oh, you have beautiful eyes.” It’s about you thinking, “Oh my gosh, look, I have really gorgeous eyes.” And it’s about finding parts of your body that you really feel excited about and finding how we can play those up. Women spend so much time saying negative things about themselves that we want to downplay those parts and start to really focus on the parts we do like because most women, we hope, can find parts of their body that they really think are pretty or attractive. So then it’s a matter of drawing focus there.

Conclusion

I felt both relieved and emboldened as I talked to Ginger, realizing that fashion doesn’t have to mean high heels and suits. Those things can be a part of a wardrobe, but it doesn’t have to be a mainstay. And neither does my yoga pants and t-shirts.

With a fiery name like Ginger and the hair to match, she’s blazing a trail for everyone from fashion phobics to those who just need a little nudge, so they can know that beauty is well within all of our reach.

One of my favorite books on names, The Secret Universe of Names, by Roy Feinson says this about people with the name Ginger, they are “subscribers to the idea of noblesse oblige: being the sovereign of their own lives comes with the responsibility of improving one’s knowledge of the universe and helping others do the same.”

Based on what I’ve learned about Ginger so far, I think this could be her personal mission statement. If you have a chance, check out Ginger Burr’s website and join a discussion with her and others on her blog or the Total Image Consultants’ FaceBook page. I know you’ll be glad you did.