By Molly O’Neill
Few people embody the spirit of HyLo better than Felicia D’Ambrosio. We’ve set out to translate the local food trend to fashion, and in her career, she’s traversed both roads. Born in Drexel Hill, Felicia spent many evenings at her grandparents’ house in Southwest Philly. Both of her grandmothers were accomplished cooks (one was a trained chef), so she grew accustomed to eating well from an early age. Her path took her from college food writing to bartending to Daily Candy freelancing to a food internship and shopping column at CityPaper – along with stints at Grid Magazine, Yelp, and more. It’s safe to say that Felicia’s knowledge of local food and fashion is uniquely comprehensive. Now, at age 30, she’s undertaken a new project: part ownership of the brand-new Federal Donuts in South Philly.
“This seems to be where destiny has taken me,” says Felicia, and destiny’s plan has thus far been a great success. In its first week open, Federal Donuts sold over 1,000 donuts every morning. The 60 orders of overnight-cured, hand-made Korean fried chicken sold out within 20 minutes each day. But what does that have to do with fashion?
As a writer, Felicia is interested in “just the fluff – no news, no crime, no City Hall, only food, fashion, art, books, fun stuff. I’m really not interested in reality,” she says. Of course, intentionally or not, she’s gained an abundance of knowledge about Philadelphians’ daily realities. From her well-trained palate and keen eye for street style to her business acumen (who would have thought a doughnut and fried chicken shop would meet such staggering demand?), Felicia has built her career on understanding what Philadelphians crave.
“I think Philly is an amazing food city, especially the diversity and the value here,” says Felicia. “You can get great food in every part of the city at reasonable, attainable prices, which I think is not something you can say in New York. We have lots of things that are delicious, and lots of people who are excited about eating those things and finding those things, which is equally important.”
Felicia gets even more excited on the subject of Philly style. “I think Philadelphia has great street style,” she says. “I see a lot of interesting clothing, interesting haircuts…What we don’t have is fashion, and so we don’t have a top-down industry that is influencing what we wear…and I think that’s okay. We’re not New York and we don’t have to be New York, and you’re not gonna see Ferragamo pumps on every woman that walks into your store, but we have amazing hidden-gem thrifting all over the area. We have great independent retailers like Bus Stop and Arcadia and Vagabond and Reward, where you can go get real fashion. If you seek it out, it’s here.”
But it’s not just the retailers contributing to Philly’s unique style scene. Felicia points out that “the influence of the art schools is not to be dismissed,” and also the fact that “it’s not so expensive to live in Philadelphia, so artists can live here, musicians can live here and ply their trades. You don’t have to make a million dollars to do what you want to do. So I really think that supports a diverse style culture, which we definitely have. I mean, we have hip-hop, we have the weird anarchist kids, we have the bicycle messengers. I mean, who brought skinny jeans back? Bicycle messengers. And above the knee shorts for men? Bicycle messengers! …Lots of things happen here.”
Felicia expresses the sentiment that embodies what we love about Philly style: “I kinda just do what I do and like what I like, and I don’t really care if it’s in style or if other people like it.” It’s clear though, from her following of readers, bar regulars, and Federal Donuts patrons, that Philadelphians do like it. We like it very much indeed.
