Fashion & Retail
Fernanda Bohme explains how she and her sister founded a fashion retail brand which now numbers 12 boutiques across the States and turns over millions of dollars.
My name is Fernanda Bohme. My sister Vivian and I emigrated with our immediate family from Rio de Janeiro Brazil to the United States in the 90’s. Our family did not have a lot but we gained hard-working attitudes. My sister and I did many different things to raise money as we grew up, we even started our own little business ventures. But what we really wanted was to start our own retail business.
When our blogger Mary Juetten attended the fabulous Simmons Leadership
Conference last month, she met with keynote speaker Josie Natori, a native
of the Philippines who was the first woman vice president in investment banking
at Merrill Lynch and went on to found lifestyle brand Natori.
Fashion was never in her plans
I had the pleasure of interviewing Josie Natori prior to listening to Mrs. Natori address a packed room at the Simmons Women’s Leadership Conference in Boston on April 2, 2013. In its 34th year, the conference attracted over 3,000 attendees and with a Women of Influence theme, Ms. Natori was a headline speaker.
The NextWomen Fashion & Retail Theme.
Chloe Macintosh is the Co-Founder & Creative Director at MADE.com.
Launched in 2010, MADE.com offers customers original furniture at up to 70% off high street prices. Aimed at an influential yet bargain loving London crowd, MADE.com works with up-and-coming designers and skilled craftsmen to create their collections.
Made.com was awarded the Young Startup of the Year at the ‘Startups 2012’ awards.
Chloe currently directs all collections and product development at MADE.com, as well as directing and styling all the distinctive interiors shots for both online and offline marketing campaigns.
Her career in design and product development spurred from her early training in architecture. For 10 years she worked as an Associate Partner in Norman Foster's London practice developing projects with a highly influential client list.
In 2007, Chloe joined LastMinute.com Co-Founder Brent Hoberman to develop the design tools for his new home project mydeco. She was also leading the mydeco Design Board and she collaborated with Philippe Starck, Marc Newson and Terence Conran on design projects.
Chloe was born in Paris but has lived in London for the past 16 years.
The NextWomen Fashion & Retail Theme.
When I was a little girl, my parents owned a hotel in the Scottish Highlands, where I grew up. My most prominent memory from that time was the tartan pillbox hat that my mother prescribed to me as uniform, to accompany my role as bell girl.
Growing up in and around the hotel, it must have come as quite a shock when I joined the army at 17 as a trainee nurse. Having a mixed heritage (mother is Chinese, father is Scottish) I was fortunate to have been brought up with a mixture of cultures and this only fuelled my passion for adventure and travel. During my time in uniform I met my husband, Doug, an Australian Naval Officer and we settled in Australia.
Finding myself in Sydney and pregnant with my daughter Kitty, we purchased a Federation period house in which my husband and I renovated. This encouraged me to tap into my creative side and instead of me picking up my Clarinet, I picked up a sewing needle.
The NextWomen Fashion & Retail Theme.
Andrea Kolb meets Adèle Dejak, founder of the eponymous brand which employs a team of over 25 East African artisans to create a range of handmade fashion accessories.
Adèle Dejak is an impressive woman. Originally a typographic designer trained at the London College of Printing, she has become one of the most celebrated upcoming designers of Kenya.
Born of Adele’s desire to create job opportunities in Nairobi, she spent time and investment in training and up-skilling employees to share knowledge and experience. There is a strong emphasis on sustainability and engagement with local communities including working with refugee camps in northern Kenya.
The NextWomen Fashion & Retail Theme.
My life has been full of change. British born, I spent most of my youth between Canada and Jamaica before returning to the UK an adult. I've moved careers from a St Martins trained Fine Artist to Accessories Designer, Physiotherapist to Period Costume Designer.
Throughout my life I have always desired to be more independent and run my own business but didn’t believe I had the ability or skills to do so. It took dealing with the diagnosis of cancer to see I hold transferable skills and experience useful to develop a start-up business, and so began my journey to design & manufacture confidence-boosting swimwear to supply the growing global community of women living with breast size differences or imbalances.
Whilst working on a project making Victorian-style costumes for Selfridges Christmas windows, I found the lump in my right breast. Missed by all medical screening, my clinicians decided my lump was not cancerous as I was ‘too young’ and sent me home.
However I knew something didn’t feel right and insisted the lump be removed. It was found to be cancer. My life changed.
The NextWomen Fashion & Retail Theme.
Elizabeth is currently the Managing Director of Heatwave Shoes, a fast growing Singapore-based shoe label that designs, manufacture and retails female fashion footwear.
She has spearheaded the growth of the brand to 40 stores in 4 years in Asia- Pacific and is set to enter the Gulf countries and India by 2013.
More importantly, she is proud to have created a community of likeminded women and business partners in Asia and hopes to share this vision and products with the world.
Elizabeth is also the founder of a socially responsible travel initiative that focuses on trips that make change and is the Strategy Director of Global Clinic, a non-profit that brings healthcare and education to the poorest communities in the world.
Elizabeth has a passion for ideas, entrepreneurship and making both happen. Her vision is to build brands that will empower women and their journeys in the world today.
The NextWomen Fashion & Retail Theme.
As a working mother of two from San Diego, I am constantly striving to maintain a happy and healthy home while balancing my career and professional goals.
With my family’s busy schedule, some of our most precious time involves cooking and eating together. Since so much of our time together revolves around the kitchen, it has become the center of our home. I have always had an eye for interior and product design and love accessorizing my home with the latest house ware items to help it function and look its best; however I often come across products that do not appeal to women’s tastes or needs.
The NextWomen Fashion & Retail Theme.
At their core entrepreneurs take risk, often walking away from a steady paycheck to pursue something new: an idea, a passion or a market opportunity. But what do you call an entrepreneur who walks away from the security of full-time job to start a business halfway across the world, in a country where they don’t even speak the language?
This kind of stunning risk and passion is embodied in fashion entrepreneur Wee Yen Lim, co-founder of Conspiracion Moda. Wee Yen is originally from Malaysia but started her online designer dress rental business in Mexico.
The NextWomen Fashion & Retail Theme.
From my experience as a young female entrepreneur starting my own business, many questions seem to be asked. Most are due to my age:
"Was this a school project that you just continued with?"
"Do you wear your product?"
Or how about this one:
"How old are you?"
The answer to these questions are no, yes, and 20.
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