Meet Samantha Jean Moore, the multi-dimensional artist and award-winning designer behind the local sustainable fashion brand MOCOCO

By Alisha Proffitt • Photos By Patrick & Whitney Anderson of Promethean Photography Studios

Long before Samantha Jean Moore was creating couture from discarded materials, she and her sister were given the fabric scraps from their mother’s sewing room floor. They cut the pieces into shapes and made pictures of themselves. Her mother, a seamstress, could turn those scraps into something useful, and Samantha grew up with the assumption that making anything was possible. She watched her mother transform fabric into Halloween costumes, prom dresses, and whatever else the family needed. “If I could dream it, she could sew it.”

Samantha comes from a fourth-generation family of seamstresses. “When you don’t have anything to waste, you have to make every single thing count: every egg, every grain of rice, every hand-me-down or yard sale find,” she says. “Everything can have a new life if you give it enough time and attention.”

Her mother was also the person who made Samantha believe that an idea could become a physical thing. “I trusted in my mother’s abilities and pushed her beyond her own limitations because I didn’t see them.” And so, what had begun as a way to save money became the foundation of her design career.

In 2013, Samantha started MOCOCO, short for “Modern Country Couture,” with recycled burlap bags from Coffee Times, vintage bed sheets, old blue jeans, and maps. Her first product was a Kentucky-shaped pillow. She made her own patterns, hand-cut and sewed each pillow on her mother’s vintage Singer machine, and took them to festivals from Paducah to Pikeville. She became a regular at the Flea Off Market and the Night Market in Lexington. For several years, the pillows sold well enough to buy her first car and move her into her first studio apartment.

Then the market changed. Kentucky-themed products became oversaturated, and other people began imitating her designs. “Something that I poured my heart into, something that sustained me as an artist and truly changed my life, was just sort of taken away.” So she changed course. “I figured if people wanted to copy me, then they’d better get really good at sewing because I was going to make things that they couldn't copy!”

She shifted her focus onto couture, and today, she describes her circular fashion brand as "Southern eclectic streetwear and couture rooted in classic Americana: the working man, the prom queen, the Southern belle and bride." But the philosophy underneath is pretty simple: make something useful and beautiful from what has been cast aside.

Recycle the Runway gave her a place to test that ambition. She credits local designers Maui Crane and Soreyda Begley with inspiring her to push further, including creating unconventional pieces such as a bag that transformed into a cape. Samantha was competitive, too, and candid about desiring the validation that came with winning. “I was determined to make something undeniable, and it worked.” She won Recycle the Runway in 2015 and again in 2017, along with the first Audience Favorite Award in 2018. Her work also became a way for her to tell stories. In 2015, she incorporated a quote from the Statue of Liberty into a piece as a statement of solidarity with DACA recipients losing their immigration status. “Everything I create has a narrative attached to it.  I want people to feel something when they see my clothes.”

KMAC Couture became another important part of her story. Samantha showed her work on the orange runway from 2018 through 2025, using the experience not only to develop her craft but to explore what she wanted her work to say. “KMAC has pushed me to my creative limits and given me the space to process the deep emotional experiences that come up during intense work.”

She has since created sustainable pieces from hemp and discarded clothing, shown work in New York and Washington, D.C., styled for Best Dressed Kentucky 2025 (and won Best Stylist!), and participated in women-focused fashion showcases. She has also worked in film as a producer, actor, costume designer, choreographer and location scout.

“For me, it all just flows together,” she says.

For much of her career, Samantha has been a team of one, handling everything from concepts and locations to styling, hair and makeup, posing, photography, and editing. Years of traveling to craft fairs also gave her a mental map of people, places, and resources she could draw on later. Adaptability has been a necessity for her. “Nothing that I do is consistent or reliable. I’ve had to pivot many times in my career just to make ends meet.” When COVID disrupted the festivals and markets that had supported her, she moved toward costume design, theater, and acting rather than forcing MOCOCO into an online business she says simply “wasn’t where I wanted to be.”

You could say her resourcefulness goes back to the sewing room floor. “I literally make things out of trash,” Samantha says. “Just ask people. There is so much free stuff to create with.” And she is quick to point out that creativity is not an overnight skill. “Sewing is like playing basketball; it takes years of practice to be any good, and a lot of that time is spent missing a lot of baskets and getting knocked down on the court.”

In Samantha's experience, making things has meant accepting failure, rejection, and uncertainty without allowing any of them to end her journey .

“That’s the only secret. Keep doing the work. Make bad art. Show it to your friends. If people hate it, don’t let that stop you. Keep creating whatever makes you feel good. It doesn’t have to be good for anyone else .”

To learn more and follow along, visit: https://www.instagram.com/mococolex/