About us

  

     TRIGGER WARNING!!!(self harm, and mental health issues)

Hello! My name is Cole, and this is my brand, Anywhere But Here. I was hesitant to write this at first, as I was afraid of the judgment behind it, but I didn’t want the meaning going over everyone's head, because my goal is to reach people who may relate to it. Originally, it started out as a name pulled from childhood trauma, and it continued to be something while I was in high school, the worst years of my life. Eventually the name grew into more than I had expected.

Anywhere But Here stems from my childhood, as my parents always gave me the hardest time. Being in this household alone still affects me to this day, as depression runs in phases for me. I’ve become better over time with coping and being able to handle it, but it’s never truly gone. The name to me holds deep meaning after my sister had run away after coming out to my parents. They treated her horribly and would constantly make her feel less of herself, which led to exactly that. I wish I could have gone with her, it’s been almost two years and I haven’t seen nor heard much from her at all. It’s always been a dream of mine to escape the toxic household that I live in and release the grip my parents have over my mental stability and health like she did. Allowing me to be somewhere else but there.

To dig deeper into the designs to give you a bit of insight, I drew the mascot within the website banner on a ladder to explain how sometimes I feel as though I’d rather not be here at all. Completely out of this world. Alone. That’s how I felt throughout high-school and sometimes even currently. I wasn’t too close with my sister, but she was treated similar to me by my parents. To go from seeing someone everyday to not seeing them at all, I now had nobody to relate with. I couldn’t explain it to people at school, all of them were temporary friends or people who walked in and out of my life, only offering pity. But, I can’t blame them, they weren’t there to live through it all. Then came the poems; so detailed with emotions behind each one, i’d thought it let them walk through my life and feel what I went through, but they still didn’t get it and judged me from them. The brand overall, is me telling this same story in a more inviting way. Displaying my emotions as best I can, and I hope you all are open to that.

My second drop was meant to be a visual of my thoughts when I was alone and overthinking. The dark silhouettes and chains around the brain symbolize how the effects of stress, overthinking, and depression can be on me. I had wanted to turn my stories and emotions into something that was more inviting than the poems, something that everyone could understand. 

Anywhere but here to me is a phrase that roams around my head and is what i’ve felt for so long . At once, suicide use to roam my head at times , but it’s something i’ve overcome, that growth led me to cope in a different way and create a new me. I created the mascot to be an image of myself; the box over the head to symbolize social anxiety and insecurities all together while simultaneously hiding emotions. I mean thats what we all do right? Hide our more vulnerable emotions from each other? Vulnerability is viewed as a weakness to many. But to show that “weakness” and push through is true strength. I’m expressing my story through designs so others can too with my brand. Anywhere But Here is a movement to me, and I take pride and comfort in knowing my story’s out there. It kinda lifts the stress of no one understanding my emotions off my shoulders. Read deep into the designs and express how you feel with them and always; wear it with pride.