The fashion industry and clothing lovers alike are mourning the loss of legendary handbag designerKate Spade, whopassed away on Tuesday, leaving behind alegacy of iconic designs, a new company (Frances Valentine), and her husband of 24 years, Andy, and 13-year-old daughter Frances Beatrix. Spade started her namesake company from the ground-up in her apartment in 1993, and since built a business that has inspired industry insiders like Bobbi Brown andcelebrities like Reese Witherspoon. And while many aresharing their memoriesof Spade and her brand, we’re also looking back on how she viewed her journey — in her own words.
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“I saw the fashion directors — that would be your next jump from being senior fashion editor, and I thought, I don’t really see myself wanting that job … so Andy and I were out honestly at a Mexican restaurant and he just said, ‘What about handbags?'” she told NPR of her then-boyfriend, Andy Spade’s encouragement to start the company. “I said, ‘Honey, you don’t just start a handbag company.’ And he said ‘Why not, how hard can it be?’
Of course, it was harder than Andy expected. Spade added that once they spent a decent amount of money, they weren’t sure the brand would stick.
“I said I think we should shut it down,” she said about the hardships they encountered upon launching the brand. “I’m very conservative, I have no interest in losing money, and I said, we’ve already spent $4000, and I said that’s it from me, you know, I’m not a gambler.”
But before she knew it, Spade’s designs grew into a multi-million dollar empire that attracted women will all different tastes in fashion. And the company was so large that her brother-in-law, David Spade, marveled over their fortune.
“People ask me about my brother and his wife starting Kate Spade,” he told PEOPLE in 2015. “That’s interesting to people and if I had their money, I’d throw mine away.”
But many fans of the brand, which Spade started in 1993, may not know that Kate and Andy sold her namesake brand in 2006, following the birth of her daughter in 2005.
After selling more than half of her stake in the company to Neiman Marcus in 1999, the designer and her two partners sold the remainder of the company to Liz Claiborne for $59 million, and took the next decade to care for her daughter while figuring out her next move. (Kate Spade New York was then sold to Coach for $2.4 billion in May 2017, forming Tapestry, Inc.)
Then, in 2016, she began her next venture: Frances Valentine, a new shoes and accessories brand that she named after her daughter.
Spade told NPR about the funds she, her husband and their two partners used to start the new line: “We’re self-financing again, so I’m not crazy about, as I mentioned earlier, losing any money, so you know — this thing better work.”
The designer legally changed her name to Kate Valentine in honor of the label.
“I thought it was important to distinguish who I am now,” she told PEOPLE in 2016. “I’m the same person, but there’s a difference.”
source: people.com
