Persephone Collection is a unique and stylish handbag collection inspired by nature, travel, the individual, and everyday surroundings. I’m currently evolving and transforming the line to include more leather and bags that you’d love to use everyday that could go out with you to run errands but also translate to dinner or a night on the town. Keeping them stylish, practical, and unique in their own individual way is my goal. My line is always evolving and I’m always striving to make the bags better and more beautiful. The materials I use for my collection are hand selected and must be of high quality. I work with suede, leather, beading, silks, and satins. In addition I have a lot of brocade and tapestry fabric bags. For my materials I look for items, for example beads, that catch the eye in the way they sparkle or are just beautiful on their own. I also use a lot of silk and satin for my linings because I love the way they feel when you reach into the bag. I want the inside of the bag to not be overlooked and try to make it just as beautiful as the outside. Each of my bags are their own works of art. They are made for the woman who loves beautiful, unique, and well-made accessories. This is who I design for and draw inspiration from.

I’ve always loved fashion and design; although I am not formally educated in either. After looking for a bag for an event I had, and not finding anything that I really liked, I had the idea that I could make my own handbags. There was no reason why I couldn’t create beautiful bags on my own. From that idea what today is Persephone Collection was born. It didn’t happen right away and it has been challenging, and I’m still learning, but it is something that I still enjoy. I design each bag very mindful of the woman that would carry it. Would I want to use this bag? Would it make me happy and be practical and beautiful to carry? I start from my expectations as a consumer and then think further in trying to imagine what someone else might like as well. The styles that I design are made in limited quantities. I feel this keeps them special. Many of my customers love the fact that the bags are made in small quantities ensuring that their new handbag will not be on every other woman’s arm as well.

The most challenging thing about designing is communicating exactly what I want in a way that can be understood completely by my manufacturer so that the design is executed correctly with very few revisions. This is not easily accomplished. Sometimes it is a language barrier or failure to read things completely and ask questions. The nightmare scenario happens when you expect to get a new collection out by a certain date and it doesn’t happen because the designs are not executed as instructed. I recently had such a situation that I wanted to get new designs out to my rep for an upcoming show and couldn’t because the designs after months of work were still not to my satisfaction and I couldn’t send them off the way they were. This is frustrating but all I can do is try to keep moving on. With that said, there is no other feeling of satisfaction then when you see a design you came up with go from an idea in your head to a rough sketch to holding it in your hand complete, exactly as you had envisioned it. Then finding other people think it’s as great as you do-that’s why it’s all worth it.