A celebrity product endorsement is a major milestone for any designer, one that wasn't lost on Berks County's Stephanie Rado Taormina, founder and owner of the lifestyle brand Have Some Fun Today (HSFT). Certainly, it was a thrill to see photographs of Halle Berry running errands in Los Angeles in a HSFT grey muscle tank, and of Reese Witherspoon, clad in the same top, cooling off after a run near her home. “It just validates your brand, and shows that you're on the right track,” says Rado Taormina. And yet, HSFT is about more than winning over followers among Hollywood's elite, and about more than the comfortable but chic leggings, shirts, hats, totes and accessories that make up its primary line. “It's not really just a fashion brand,” explains Rado Taormina. “It's a mindset and a way of life.”
“Have some fun today” was also a mantra—her late father's favorite saying. “My father was a great man,” says Rado Taormina. “He was inspiring to a lot of people.” The Rado family (dad Joseph, mom Elaine and their five children—Stephanie is the oldest) moved to Wyomissing when Rado
Taormina was a teenager. Over his lifetime, Joseph Rado's resume would swell with accomplishments and accolades both personal and professional, but perhaps his most impressive business achievement was transforming a small, elevator circuit-board repair business out of West Chester called World Electronics into an international manufacturing facility now based in Reading. All the while, says Rado Taormina, her father always maintained a sunny disposition and a lust for life. His employees were well-acquainted with his favorite saying; it even popped up on their pay stubs. “He was the most positive person I ever met,” says Rado Taormina.
But he wasn't the only person who played a role in shaping her during those early years. Rado Taormina credits two women in her life with helping her cultivate her creative side. Her mother owned a beauty salon for many years; Rado Taormina recalls perusing the fashion magazines that kept customers occupied at the shop. And her grandmother, she says, renovated homes. “I was always around these things as a little girl,” says Rado Taormina. “I was always fascinated by fashion, beauty and design.”
She studied advertising and marketing at Penn State before deciding to go “all in” on a career in the arts. She credits a summer spent in France with helping her to reconnect with her creative roots. Following her graduation from PSU in 1987, she moved to New York City to pursue a BFA in fashion design at Parsons School of Design. In the years that followed, Rado Taormina worked her way up in the business; designer Adrienne Vittadini and luxury brand Andrew Marc were among her employers. She married and had a pair of daughters: Allegra and Gabrielle. Her brood moved back to Berks County in the late 1990s when Rado Taormina's then-husband (they divorced in 2008) wanted to work for her family's business. Even though she missed the energy of the big city, Rado Taormina kept the creative juices percolating with the founding of her own interior design company. She also sold her artwork and paintings to clients all over the world.
The chain of events that would lead to the conception of Have Some Fun Today began with a devastating blow to the Rado family. Five years ago, their beloved patriarch began to struggle with complications from diabetes. But even as the disease progressed, Rado Taormina says her father's optimism remained a force to be reckoned with. “Even in the hospital, he'd find the energy to tell you to have some fun today.” Joseph Rado passed away on April 25, 2014. Rado Taormina says a thousand people paid their respects at his funeral. And then, a remarkable thing happened: His favorite phrase took on a life of its own. It was shared fondly among mourners and well-wishers. It was mentioned in his obituary. It even began to pop up on social media. Clearly, this was a man—and a motto—who had left his mark.
Rado Taormina can vividly recall the moment when her father's mantra became her fashion brand's hallmark. “As an artist, I always have a vision of how I'm going to do a painting or design a room,” she explains. She was sitting on her couch one morning, a few months after her father died, when one of those visions popped into her head. “I visualized a painting that said, ‘Have some fun today.' And it went right to a tote bag. And then a trucker hat. And then a shirt.” In fact, she says, she mapped out an entire line in her head in just a matter of minutes.
Rado Taormina says she initially thought she'd sell a few items on Etsy and call it a day. But word of mouth and a strong social media presence—coupled with good old-fashioned tenacity—helped HSFT quickly find a following. “In less than a year, I had a website and I had product,” she says. She drew inspiration for her pieces from her own inner circle—her friends and family, and the lifestyle they were accustomed to. “It was myself, the people I hung out with,” Rado Taormina says. “We talked about wellness, living a balanced life, working out.” And relatability was essential. “I wanted it to be something my kids could wear, I could wear, my mom could wear.”
Of course, there are several steps that come between visualizing an item of clothing and then holding the finished product in your hands, and Rado Taormina says it's been more or less a one-woman production from the beginning. “I work all day long, seven days a week,” she says with a laugh.
Outside of some key assists from her daughters, Rado Taormina is the company's CEO and CEE (“chief everything else”). She uses subcontractors when necessary, but handles the brunt of the planning, design and marketing herself, and admits it can be exhausting. She recalls one day last year in which she had to drive three hours to Avalon, New Jersey for a holiday sales event called Shopaholics; she was tired and frustrated. She looked to the heavens and asked her father for a sign, a validation that her hard work was paying off. Minutes later, she says, she began receiving text messages that actress Kate Hudson was photographed wearing a HSFT hoodie in Manhattan. It was a major coup for the company at the time, but it would hardly be the last. “We have people traveling all over the world, photographed wearing our stuff,” says Rado Taormina. And it's not just her client base that's gone international; HSFT products are available at several high-end, luxury hotel boutiques and spas around the globe, like The Sugar Mill in the Bahamas, the Fontainebleau in Miami and the Mandarin Oriental. But, no passport, no problem: HSFT also operates an online store.
While her days now are still jam-packed, Rado Taormina can afford to take a few moments to marvel at her success. “[It's] literally a little brand from Wyomissing. A woman doing it herself in a house. It's surreal to me. But just because I live in a little town doesn't mean I don't have talent.”
She envisions her company expanding both its clothing line (more activewear offerings, perhaps an infusion of street style in the design) as well as its scope. “Eventually, we'd like to get to a place where we can do wellness programs for adults and children to really get to the meaning of HSFT,” Rado Taormina says. Those changes may be launched from another coast: She has plans to relocate to California, where two of her siblings live. But, no matter where HSFT is based, its core mission, says Rado Taormina, will remain the same: remembering her father by encouraging all members of the HSFT tribe to live life like he did. “I feel like I'm honoring his legacy.”
