About Gromidez

The company began in Gainesville, FL in 2004 as the brainchild of Maygin and a college friend. The two wanted to create corsets, costumes and provide makeup services for both special occasions and costumes/photography. The name, Gromidez, is a word Maygin put together from one definition of “gothic”.

Goth·ic

 

adj.

A novel in a style emphasizing the grotesque, mysterious, and desolate.

From this, they formed a business name utilizing the beginning sounds of each: GROtesque, MYsterious, DESolate. Some fancy letter-swapping created the name you know today, Gromidez.

After Maygin left Gainesville, she decided to pursue the business on her own, concentrating on creating custom corsets and other commissioned clothing and costumes. Over the years she found an interest in hair falls, making dreadlocks and other hairpieces from synthetic hair. She found that corsets and hair falls tended to appeal to a similar group of people and wanted to expand her own horizons as well as the company’s.

In 2008, Maygin attended a Medieval Faire in Ft. Meyers where she was hired to play a chess piece on the living chess board. While browsing the various booths, she came across a couple of gentlemen working chainmaille (or chainmail), something Maygin had wanted to learn for years. Upon revealing this, her now good friend, Steven Spinosa of Stalwart Armor, offered to teach her the basics of working maille. She has since learned much about it and added it to her repertoire- and has since returned to the Faire twice as an apprentice/artist in that very booth.

For years, Gromidez was little more than a hobby for Maygin, having hardly any time to fully realize the business’ potential. In 2009, she decided to try her hand at selling her creations at a booth during Florida Supercon in Miami. Maygin proudly lay out a variety of corsets and hair falls and chainmaille creations welcoming the masses to come and buy her works of art. Unfortunately, due to the recent economy failures and the ill-matched nature of her inventory to the demographic, Gromidez didn’t do too well.

Not to be discouraged, though, Maygin tapped into her long-unused talents of crocheting and knitting to knock out a number of plushies inspired by video games, cartoons, and comics – just what the doctor ordered for a convention geared toward those interests! She also tried her hand at crafting clay charms to accompany her other creations. With the corsets, hair falls, and chainmaille as accents, the Gromidez booth at Animation Supercon 2009 in Miami was a roaring success!

With the knowledge and esteem gained from that very endeavor, Maygin has since worked to make Gromidez what you know it as today. And like its creator, the company will surely continue to grow and develop with every new experience.