“I’d heard about human trafficking through the church that I go to,” she tells VF. “I couldn’t believe that it was happening in today’s society, but it’s also happening on our doorstep. We just wanted to go and find out a little bit more.”
It was an eye-opening experience for them both. They were living in South Delhi, a very different environment than the Gloucester countryside where Rufus Isaacs was raised, and they were working with women who had experienced trauma and abuse.
It was also an education in how the economic context can influence a person’s vulnerability to sex work and exploitative labor conditions. “We were teaching them very basic sewing skills in the afternoon,” Rufus Issacs explains. “And I loved the idea of teaching these women a skill that could keep them from going back into that life and give them a sustainable livelihood.”
Before the trip, Rufus Isaacs had been working at Sotheby’s and didn’t have a background in fashion other than being, as she puts it, “obsessed with dresses.” But Atulya had them thinking about starting a business that would allow them to keep contributing their energy and funds to the women they had been working with.
Rufus Isaacs remembered the perfect idea coming to mind as the pair relaxed on a day off. “We were flicking through a magazine, and we just sort of said, why don’t we just set up a fashion business?” she says. “Why don’t we set up a dress brand—actually being inspired by India, by the colors, by the fabrics—that can then have a positive impact on these women?”
Beulah’s founding coincided with a period when human trafficking and modern slavery were becoming mainstream concerns. In 2000, the United Nations adopted the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, after observing that globalization had altered value chains and labor markets in a way that increased labor abuse. By the end of the decade, governments across the globe were coming up with methods for intervening in trafficking networks. Through nonprofits like Love146 and Agape International Missions, nongovernmental organizations around the world were putting the issue on the agenda too.
At a moment when ethical fashion was also taking off as a tool for brand awareness and customer retention, Beulah was positioned to succeed, though Rufus Isaacs says that, in hindsight, she wishes she had gone to business school before diving in. But with a bit of seed funding—and the type of press attention that comes from being a longtime friend of Prince William—they made a splash early on. They also made inroads with an array of other British women who straddle the line between It girl and aristocrat, like Cressida Bonas, a former girlfriend of Prince Harry.
Though the brand’s backstory helped propel it to the forefront of British fashion, the founders’ innate sense for the type of events their customer would be attending, be it the Royal Ascot or a formal wedding, helped them stay popular with those looking to make an investment for a piece that will last.
“I think it is our timeless, romantic pieces,” Rufus Isaacs says. “Our Ahana [style], for example, is our best-selling product. We’ll bring it out in different colorways, and it’s gone within, like, a couple of weeks. So we had a lemon Ahana, which has little buttons down the front. It’s quite romantic in that sense.”
These are, in other words, occasion dresses, and it meant that a world without events would prove perilous for the brand. “COVID was really tricky for the business, because suddenly our sales went from a record February, and then they dropped off a cliff, because suddenly there is no Ascot, and none of all those events that our customer goes to,” Rufus Isaacs says. “No one was going to any weddings, any events, so that was really tricky.”
The July 2020 liquidation came at the end of a few shaky years for the brand. That month, the Mail on Sunday called it the result of “the Kate curse,” noting that a few other brands that had dressed the royal in her early years had shuttered. But over time, the pandemic proved to be a generational reckoning for independent fashion businesses across the globe, and a moment where designers were increasingly forthright about the long-term headwinds facing the industry.
The restructuring also happened as both founders were going through changes in their personal life. Brennan became a mother for the first time, and Rufus Isaacs gave birth to her third daughter. Though Beulah had been like a child for Rufus Isaacs, having a family of her own meant that she was more “ruthless” in her decision-making process so she could make it home to her children. It also solidified her passion for the business and its mission.
Erin Vanderhoof
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