What happens when you combine a software engineer and the daughter of a seamstress?
For Nina, founder of MadeApt, the answer is a platform designed to make custom clothing more accessible. Using AI, MadeApt connects ideas with the skilled people who can actually bring them to life.
Nina's connection to fashion started when she was young. Her mum had always loved fashion and self-expression, but was never able to find work in the fashion industry that paid enough to make a living.
Instead, she passed that love of fashion on to Nina. They didn't have a big budget for ready-made clothing, so they would find random fabrics and her mum would turn them into beautiful clothes for Nina.
At the time, Nina didn't think much of it. It was only after moving to Australia that she realised what a privilege that experience actually was. Having clothes made specifically for your body, choosing the fabric yourself and having a real connection with the person making them was something most people didn't have access to.
Coming from that experience, it felt almost dystopian to Nina that something so personal had become so inaccessible.
By then, Nina had become a software engineer, and she started thinking about how technology could help make that experience accessible again. Could technology bring back some of that personalisation and choice, while still making it possible to work at scale?
MadeApt was born somewhere in the middle.
Making custom clothing more accessible
MadeApt is building a platform where people can develop clothing around their own ideas, explore what works and then connect those designs with independent tailors who can make them.
AI helps make that process possible by helping customers visualise ideas, customise designs and communicate exactly what they want, while creating workflows that make one-off clothing more practical.
For Nina, that's where the opportunity gets interesting. AI doesn't need to replace the tailor. Instead, it can help more people access their expertise.
“The skilled tailor is still central to the process. AI helps connect the customer’s imagination with the person who has the craft to make it real.”
For Nina, the technology is there to support the people behind the process, not replace them.
Taking MadeApt from vision to reality
When Nina joined Spacecubed's AI Fellowship, supported by Scale Partners, MadeApt already had a clear direction. What she needed was the ability to move faster.
The Fellowship's technical credits have given room to experiment, build and test without those costs eating into the rest of the business. For Nina, this has allowed a limited operating budget to be spread across onboarding people, reaching customers and growing the human side of the business.
During the Fellowship, Nina has built new demos and developed a program that allows designers and small businesses to use MadeApt's tools in their own work. Nina is now exploring how to bring more companies onto the platform too.
For an early-stage business, that extra space to test an idea can make a significant difference.
Finding clarity outside the fashion world
Some of the most useful parts of the Fellowship haven't been technical at all.
Explaining MadeApt to people who don't come from fashion has forced Nina to strip the idea back and get clearer on what the business is actually building.
The more she explained it, the clearer the distinction became: MadeApt isn't another AI image generator. It's building the bridge between an idea, a finished garment and the person with the skills to make it.
Having founders and mentors from completely different industries challenge the model has helped sharpen both the product and the story behind it.
It's also given Nina a more realistic view of what building a startup actually looks like.
From the outside, it's easy to assume everyone else has figured it out. Inside a room full of founders, you quickly realise most people are still experimenting, making decisions with incomplete information and figuring things out as they go.
Building something people trust
That mindset has also shaped how Nina thinks about growth. Rather than chasing a sudden spike in attention, MadeApt is focused on building relationships with the people who will actually use, make and grow alongside the platform.
For Nina, meaningful growth is less about one big moment and more about continuing to show up. It's a slower approach, but one that creates trust in the long run.
What's next for MadeApt?
The next step is a new version of the MadeApt experience, designed to make the journey from an initial idea to a finished garment even more intuitive.
Nina wants to get the tools into the hands of more designers, students and small businesses, giving them an easier way to develop ideas, experiment with fabrics, visualise clothing and communicate designs.
The bigger ambition is simple: give someone the freedom to imagine the clothes they actually want to wear, then make it possible to take that idea off the screen and into the hands of someone who knows how to make it. To learn more about MadeApt you can visit their website here or connect with Nina via LinkedIn here.
See Nina pitch MadeApt at our upcoming AI Fellowship and Founder Sprint Demo Night on September 24th. Register here!
Spacecubed's AI Fellowship is a 3-month, in-person program designed for ambitious founders ready to build and launch AI-driven products. Explore more about the program and submit your expression of interest to be part of our next cohort here!