MEL USINE tells stories through dress. Each season begins with remnants—forgotten folklore, provincial customs, vernacular craft, overlooked histories, and inherited mythologies—sutured into a contemporary wardrobe. Existing between the real and the imagined, each collection stages otherwise impossible conversations where the past is not just remembered but inhabited.
Defined by an uncompromising approach to silhouette, fabrication, and construction, each garment embodies the intelligence of craft through exacting execution, precise fit, and considered detail. Rather than recreating history, MEL USINE reinterprets its vestiges, allowing them to be embodied anew.
At its core is a reverence for the human form, where stories become lived experience.
Stephen Biga, our Founder, received a BFA in Fashion Design from Parsons School of Design with a focus on womenswear and a BA in Culture & Media Studies from The New School with a concentration in critical identity theory and experimental cinema. He has worked in design at Proenza Schouler, Gabriela Hearst and Rodarte in Los Angeles and New York City. In 2024 he founded Mel Usine, serving as our Creative Director.
Our inaugural collection, Spring / Summer 2026, debuted in September 2025 in New York City, and was lauded by industry peers, garnering coverage from esteemed publications including: the New York Times, Vogue, i-D, Harper’s Bazaar, WWD, Vogue Business, and Who What Wear. Mel Usine was heralded by industry powerhouse Julie Gilhart as “fresh and distinctive” in an interview with Vogue Business, and was deemed by i-D magazine as “the future and present of New York Fashion Week.”
Our sophomore collection, Fall / Winter 2026, showed in February 2026 in New York City to positive reception, with coverage by W, Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, WWD and Coveteur.