Twenty Too Clothing | About Our Founder

HELLo,

I am Mtisunge Lucy Ngwira, the CEO and Founder of Twenty Too Clothing. Twenty Too was initially

launched in January of 2015, between my junior and senior years of high school. Back then, Twenty Too was more simplistic; it was just a run-of-the-mill clothing brand, akin to the lemonade stands that many children start in the summer. It wasn't the universal brand that it is today. I was just a kid who happened to have disabilities and embraced a love for fashion and entrepreneurship — passions that were passed down from my siblings, who raised me after our parents passed. I was a kid who bore the weight of the world on her back and wanted to create something to help cope with the chaos that I lived in. In the earliest days, I used to sell in my classes, and in my first month, I made $100.

Even as a teenager, I have always been about unity and empathy. Even if I do not know your struggle personally, I acknowledge that it exists. Representation matters.

My experiences in the transition from a plus-size disabled black girl to a woman have shaped my business and the vision that I have today. From being bedridden after high school, ages 18 through 20, and suffering stress-induced psychosis at age 21, after years of prolonged abuse and various severe traumas — such as finding out I was born HIV positive at age 13 and nearly dying from a late-stage AIDS diagnosis leaving me permanently disabled just three years after losing both my parents — my experiences throughout life were anything but ordinary.

During the years between 19 and 21, Twenty Too went silent. I couldn't bear what was going on around me and simultaneously build a business. I let my dreams die and was ready to go with them.

Months after leaving the mental hospital, luck finally struck, and I was able to move into a group home for the chronically ill. I finally had a sense of stability and safety. I started toying with the idea: What if I picked it back up again? What would that be like? That was in 2019/2020. It definitely wasn't easy to reopen a business amidst a pandemic, but I managed.

When Twenty Too reopened, it was different. I was different. Having experienced being severely disabled and bedridden in my late teens shifted my perspective, and I knew that I had to incorporate disability awareness into my business. Those days where I would spend 10+ hours, five days a week in a dark room, in excruciating pain, with vicious nausea, being manacled to my bed while my friends went off to parties and became independent — it all felt like a pipe dream for me. If I couldn't even take care of myself, how could I ever transcend and become the powerful businesswoman I always wanted to be?

I never saw anyone like myself in the media succeeding; they were only ever objects of suffering. Representation matters.

Experiences like that change a person. They simultaneously make your world so small and open your eyes so wide. It is so common to struggle with a disability, from daily tasks like moving around in the world to getting dressed, to bigger aspects of life like working, schooling, and independence. It is often seen as the norm to be excluded from every facet of life, and it is expected that disabled people will live with their families their whole lives.

So who was I, a sick/disabled orphan girl, to think I could ever achieve not just the ordinary but the extraordinary? I didn't even have the basics for myself or my business. In 2020, I started out with $30 and got the very basics that you need to print on t-shirts — blanks, iron-on transfers, and an iron. The room that I resided in the group home was only 230 sq ft, so small that I didn't even have the space to make clothing anywhere besides laying a towel on the floor, getting on my knees, and printing on it by hand. When you have a dream and a vision, you do anything for it. Within a year, that $30 turned into $300.

As an entrepreneur and creative, I've explored various ideas over time, and made a decision driven by my passion for unity, my love for punk culture, and a deep sense of empathy, I realized that this shouldn't merely reflect my own experiences with disability. It should encompass everyone. Representation matters. This brand should be Universal—everyone deserves to see themselves positively represented and no one should feel overlooked or misinterpreted. My vision is for everyone to thrive. It's striking that I've yet to encounter a brand that is truly Universal.

Over time, I dedicated myself to refining my business operations, investing in superior equipment, enhancing production quality, and implementing efficient systems. I knew it was essential to move beyond outdated practices like hand irons and fading iron-on transfers. This commitment resulted in Twenty Too teaming up with one of the oldest and most respected adaptive brands, J&E Talit. My relentless efforts paid off, culminating in the launch of a lookbook that attracted tens of thousands of views.

"People like my concepts and art?"

Some days it would be challenging, and some days I wanted to give up. It felt like I was putting in so much work with very little outcome, and seeing this affirmed for me was a glimmer of hope to keep going, despite what people would tell me. Back in those days, I had dreams of being on television one day for my clothing brand. Every day that I returned from a local HIV support group at the Community Counseling Center, I would pass by the Review Journal, hoping that one day I would make headlines for something meaningful.

And one day, that was exactly what happened.

After taking on some side ventures in public speaking and accumulating accolades such as documentary showings, standing ovations, awards, and the like, I was discovered by Christina Aldan of Luckygirliegirl, who asked me if I wanted to take my story and my clothing brand Twenty Too, to one of the most well-known news outlets in Southern Nevada on Channel 3 KSNV News. There was no way I could have said no; this was exactly what I was asking for, and it had presented itself to me front and center.

The next six months were spent preparing for my debut, and on July 29th, 2024, I appeared in a million homes across Southern Nevada. Twenty Too Clothing, The US TOO Brand a brand that is truly for everyone and is steeped in old-fashioned punk values, representing every age, size, race, belief, ability, and the gender spectrum—a brand that is about putting those who are misunderstood, misrepresented, or not represented at all front and center. Since the televised debut, Twenty Too has hit the airwaves on iHeartRadio and landed additional televised interviews with nationally recognized talk shows like Living Full Out. Twenty Too is no longer the glorified lemonade stand it was in 2015; it is the world's first Universal punk brand. It is unfit and unruly for boxes, fashioned for unity, made for every body and every story, every time. Join the movement, Get Fierce and break the fashion industry.

#THEUSTOOBRAND