A conversation with Mara Hoffman rarely unfolds along a single thread. It moves fluidly between the creative and the contemplative, the poetic and the esoteric, the deeply personal and the profoundly felt. One almost always leaves inspired.

Such was the case earlier this month when Hoffman called in from Sausalito. Surrounded by the beauty of the coastal California town, she reflected on her transition from fashion to photography and clairvoyance—an evolution that feels less like a career pivot than an expansion of her creative expression.

In 2024, Hoffman closed the doors of her eponymous fashion label after 24 years. During that time, she built a devoted following through her commitment to conscious design, helping to shape conversations around sustainability long before they became industry mandates.

Today, her focus has shifted to MaraHoffmanStudio, a multidisciplinary practice centered on photography, creative direction, and visual storytelling.

“I shot all of our campaigns for the past decade, which allowed me more space for creative control,” Hoffman said. “For designers, that’s a difficult thing to relinquish. I could carry a vision from concept to material, from emotion to the way it was ultimately presented to the world. I loved that part of my job.”

A lifelong dancer, Hoffman found a natural connection to photography. As she puts it, there was something about movement—about being in relationship with it – that she also found in photography. To her, it became an exercise in returning to my body.”

When she made the decision to close her brand, she wasn’t immediately focused on what would come next.

“It was deeper and bigger than that,” she says. “After 24 years, I had to take a hard look at what continuing would mean, and what it would mean not to.”

There was no carefully mapped-out plan waiting on the other side.

“I didn’t have a defined idea of what I was going to do,” she says. “I thought, ‘Just breathe. Detox. Figure out who you are without being a brand.’ That took time. During that period, I knew I wanted to create work without the pressure of selling it. It was about something larger than that. It was about storytelling.”

Last summer, Hoffman began organizing and editing the body of work she had accumulated over the years. At the same time, she collaborated with creative agency Materia on the launch of her new website and immersed herself in clairvoyant studies.

“It was therapeutic to revisit those years of work,” she explains. “It was also incredibly vulnerable.”

She recalls walking to a CFDA cocktail hosted by Gabriela Hearst at Bar Oliver the evening before launching the site, surrounded by peers still fully immersed in the relentless rhythm of the fashion cycle.

“I was talking to my husband on the way there,” she remembers. “He told me, ‘When people ask what you’re doing, lean into the clairvoyant side. Nobody loves the esoteric and psychic world more than fashion people.’”

For Hoffman, however, the moment carried a more personal significance.

“I did the singular creative expression,” she says. “This next chapter feels very much like a multi-hyphenate one. I am a photographer. I am a creative director. I am a dancer. I am a clairvoyant.”

The freedom to inhabit all of those identities feels essential.

“Being able to remain in an expanded creative expression for the rest of my life feels deeply important,” she added.

Asked to describe her photographic style, Hoffman doesn’t hesitate. “It’s all eye, body, and instinct. It’s like a dance. It captures life force. It’s gritty. It can hold sensuality. It’s the opposite of sterile. It’s imperfectly alive. The opposite of AI.”

As she continues to explore creative expression across multiple dimensions, Hoffman has also gained a new perspective on her years in fashion.

“I was running on an engine,” she recalls. “You don’t really understand your system until you stop operating it at maximum capacity. For so long, my external output was tied to selling things. Once that stopped, my work began moving through me differently—with more pace, more time, and more artistry.”

The shift also transformed her relationship with consumption.

“It became quieter,” she says. “More personal. A commitment you make with yourself—to move through the world with kindness, all the time.”