“To those of you out there who think you might want to be a matchmaker one day, just realize crazy shit like this is going to start happening to you,” Amy Van Doran told Jezebel, showing off her bright-orange wardrobe items that perfectly match her bright orange-hair and bright orange-shoes.
It’s Doran’s job as founder of the Modern Love Club to match things, specifically people looking for love. And her style, which includes her signature orange hair (though it’s been many bright, candy colors before) is something she uses to get people to talk and open up to her, something that’s key to building a great rolodex as a matchmaker. Van Doran started her company a decade ago in New York when she was tired of seeing the way typical matchmaking services were run: usually older men set up with much younger women. A big part of matchmaking, for her, is visualizing people together which she does by laying out photos of her clients and thinking about their romantic goals.
When Jezebel visited her closet, which takes up the space of a small room in her Williamsburg apartment, her clothing rack was filled with all sorts of odds and ends: children’s space suits, circus costumes, pillbox hats inspired by Mondrian paintings and more. Doran’s grandmother who was a circus performer ended up inspiring the way she approached clothes. “I just assumed dress-up clothes were how people dressed,” she says.
Video by Phoebe Bradford, Jennifer Perry and Zoe Stahl.