Edara Apparel

Edara Apparel's first tennis dresses were fitted over video calls. Laura Nunnelly, who started the Park City company at her kitchen table, told TownLift that each dress took six or seven rounds of fittings during the pandemic, all of them on screens. "It's important to me that my clothes are made in the USA so the calls were only from Los Angeles," she said.

The idea came from sun and from fidgeting. Nunnelly had melanoma removed from her midsection in 2017, she told Mountain Park City, and she did not want to give up sun safety on the court. In her view the dresses she found were rather shapeless and needed separate shorts. "If something was riding up, I would need to tuck it back in. Or if it was too short, I'd be distracted," she said.

Her answer was a one-piece dress built to look like a skirt and top. Its shorts are sewn in, with a gripper at the hem and pockets built into the shorts. The Signature Long-Sleeved Dress uses hidden zippers at the shoulder and center so the fitted cut still comes on and off. A best seller, the company says, is the Signature Tie-Back Dress, whose extra wide waistband sits under an open back that ties tight or loose.

Nunnelly came to the business sideways. She studied art history and sold real estate, and tennis, she told TownLift, was "the one hour a week whereby I didn't answer client calls." The name blends the names of her two daughters, who play at the MARC in Park City and keep asking when she will make clothes in their sizes. The company is named after them, so they have leverage.

Since then the line has grown past dresses into skirts and sports bras. Edara now recruits athletes as ambassadors. Production stays in the United States, which the company says cuts down on long-distance shipping.

The Utah part is the kitchen table where it started. The rest is a dress designed so a player who has already had one scare with the sun does not have to trade coverage for a clean serve.