Susanna Merrick, intuitive aura reader and stylist, has always seen the world through colors. From a young age she says she began seeing bright glows around her family and friends, but didn’t make it her career until age 31. Launching Aura Wear NYC in July of last year, Susanna has combined her love of styling with aura reading to create a deeply personal service, performing intuitive readings of her clients’ auras then styling them or giving them a “closet cleanse” according to the colors.
Growing up in Missouri, Kansas City, with an intuitive mother and father working as a preacher in a local church, Susanna’s childhood was filled with “weird experiences.” “I have this vivid memory of me staring at these orbs out of the window,” she explains. “They were always outside, very big, and floating towards me.” As a teenager, she put these experiences down to her imagination. Because her mother’s intuitive gifts were “intense” and often frighteningly accurate, Susanna was largely secretive about the colors she was seeing. When she did tell her father, he replied, “That’s normal, Jesus had an aura.”
It wasn’t until Susanna moved away for studying performing arts in Savannah, Georgia, that she began to get in touch with her gifts and experiences. “I did this color theory project, which was all about light and energy, and was experimenting with different situations socially so started to feel in touch with that part of myself.” This, she says, did not last when she moved to New York to pursue a Broadway career. “It’s like the busiest, craziest city. As soon as it came, it was gone and I was laser-focused on performing and being an actor.”
After years of traveling and touring, Susanna went through some transformative life events, including her mother passing away, that lead to a moment of realization that she should be incorporating her gift with colors into her work. “It was like the ethers opened and I was able to be like, okay, this is what I’m supposed to do,” she explains. At the time, she was working “odd jobs”, including babysitting and styling, something she did in college in between theater projects.
The idea for Aura Wear NYC was born after she asked herself the question “I’m a stylist, so how can I incorporate auras?” From there, Susanna says, things began to unfold, as styling had always felt natural to her. She started by creating a website and started giving small readings at events. Now, Susanna explains that there are usually three types of clients that come to her: someone going through a transition in their life, someone seeking answers, and someone who isn’t feeling themselves. While I didn’t fit into any of those categories, Susanna joined me for an evening on my couch, for an intuitive reading and styling session.
As soon as Susanna arrived, it became clear that the sessions went far beyond typical styling services. Speaking with me for over an hour about every aspect of my life, Susanna’s readings feel like speaking to a friend that will sometimes say, “when you said that, I just saw a flash of blue.” Her warm approach makes for little surprise that she often is asked to come over at some of the most pivotal or heartbreaking times in people’s lives. In one session Susanna says she was visited by the recently deceased grandmother of the client.
A session with Susanna begins with reading both your innate or intrinsic aura, one that for the most part stays the same, and your dynamic aura, the energy being put out in the moment. Susanna uses this reading to advise her clients on when and why to wear color, as your dynamic aura, she explains, often shifts due to a transition to a different life phase. After the initial reading, she draws four energy cards to map the flow of energy in different aspects of our lives.
My dynamic aura, apparently, was a “cluster-fuck,“ but my innate energy is a combination of red and magenta. This led our styling session. Making herself at home in my wardrobe, I watched Susanna pull pieces that I never would have put together, instructing me to stick to my “healing colors” (green, blues, and purples) for this time in my life and energy. I then watched her to get down to the finer details, suggesting I replace the necklace I was wearing from my ex-boyfriend with one from my grandmother and to absolutely veer away from red for the time being (to lean away from my red energy and into my magenta).
By the end of the session, I had a few new outfit combinations under my belt, and affirmation that pairing blue eyeliner with a blue dress and blue shoes is not too much blue for me. It felt as if a cool aunt had come in to hear me vent, tell me things about myself, and then inspire my choices. And that’s really what makes Susanna’s work so tailored and personal. Through colors, clothes, and conversations, her readings help clients to express what’s happening internally on the outside, using fashion as an outlet for self-expression and healing.
“When you get a reading, you’re coming to me no matter what your religious background is.” Susanna says. “Whatever it is you believe or whether you believe, you know we’re putting our higher consciousness together to cultivate the answers.”