The Team
Dibo Bodi is a child of the pandemic. We had been sewing face masks and selling them locally when a corset we had purchased for our vintage hobby business attracted huge interest. It was followed by another and before we knew it we had created our first corset in Feb 2021.
Continuing with the up-cycling theme, our early corsets were produced from rolls of fabric sourced from local thrift shops and we even did a denim range made from second-hand jeans (seriously jorsets? too right - they had pockets!!!).
Supply was very quickly overtaken by demand. The second-hand industrial sewing machines took over the front room of our house as they multiplied and were joined by an oversized cutting table, clothes racks and rolls, and rolls of fabric.
By late 2021 we had outgrown all of the spaces in our house and were freaking out at the prospect of needing to rent some premises. Australia was starting to open back up and Indy was proving to be a great designer and buyer of fabrics, vintage clothing, and new wholesale clothing so we “bit the bullet” and signed a lease.
Dibo Bodi opened our retail space, with a display room and space for 6 sewing machines in Feb 2022. We now employ 6 staff who range in age from 16 to 60 and fill hundreds of orders that are shipped all around the globe every week. We’ve stayed true to our roots with a dedicated section for vintage clothing and corsetry representing the majority of our stock. Our machines are still vintage too, and the whole shop has been decked out with second-hand furniture sourced from Facebook marketplace.
We hand make most of our stock in Melbourne and pay our team fairly. Dibo Bodi products are only available from our retail space in Glen Iris or through our online store. We’re not squeezing our worker’s wages to try to fit into a wholesale sales model or outsourcing labor overseas to drive up profits. We love our new space and enjoy working to music (and the occasional podcast) and hope you enjoy browsing our store.
Stay up to date with all of our new fabrics and designs by following us on Instagram and TikTok using the links under "Connect" below.
How can I do a collaboration with Dibo Bodi?
We get asked pretty much every day about collaborations on TikTok and Instagram. In lieu of responding to each email, we have outlined below the types of collaborations that we have done regularly that have proven to work for both parties.
- Local collabs: We are always looking for creative ways to make our content more interesting and engaging and this often involves working with fresh faces. We are Melbourne based and Indi posts daily on socials. Most collabs of this kind involve a weekend shoot in our local area. We like to have fun on these shoots and if they work everyone gets an uplift in exposure. We also offer a product for repeat collaborators to take.
- Influencer collabs: All of our successful influencer collabs have started with a purchase. We have sent out free product to some influencers but have almost never seen this work unless the influencer has purchased in the past. Established celebrities and influencers like Maddie B Webb and Abbie Chatfield started out this way and when we release a new design that we think matches their style we will often reach out about a collaboration based on free product.
- Viral collaborations: Sometimes a customer will post their Dibo Bodi purchase online and the post will go crazy. This can happen regardless of the following they had prior to the post. This happened with a UK customer called Arabella that spawned a collection in our store. We have continued to send style appropriate samples to Arabella.
Please don’t be offended if we don’t respond to your request to collaborate outside of these tried and tested methods. We might change things in the future but as it stands we will stick with what is working.