S. Denise Hoyle | January 8, 2010
Tina Schatzberg had left her career as an advertising sales executive to be a stay-at-home mom, however she still had a passion for marketing and wanted a more flexible means of pursuing that passion. When Schatzberg’s mother lost her job as a sewer for an automotive supplier in Detroit, the two decided to go into [...]
S. Denise Hoyle | December 3, 2009
Hi I’m Hannah Stevenson from While They Sleep Designs. I am wife to a great guy named Jeff (the handsome man in the green). And I am “Momma” to three little girls all under the age of two: Twin girls Laurel (green skirt) and Maisy (blue skirt, scowl on face) and our [...]
S. Denise Hoyle | November 5, 2009
Lillian Weber says she took a year of sewing in 4H when she was 17 years old, but she forgot all about sewing as she pursued other interests and goals. After her three children were born, Lillian says “the creative side of me was itching to get out and do something.” Since money was tight, [...]
S. Denise Hoyle | October 20, 2009
Erica Leigh of Sweets & Hearts is up to her ears in ears! Erica sells hair accessories such as headbands with kitty or mouse ears, as well as costumes and clothing designs, and she recently sold her 100th pair of ears.
Erica is a college student studying fashion marketing who lives at home with her mom [...]
S. Denise Hoyle | January 13, 2009
Fay Brittingham says she’s been sewing for 53 years. She learned the basics in a home economincs class in her freshman year, and has kept learning ever since.Brittingham’s love of sewing led her to start her own mail order and internet based business selling fabric, known as Fay’s Fabrics. She fills a niche that most fabric [...]
S. Denise Hoyle | January 9, 2009
Mel Pennington and Tygh Bailes stumbled on a new clothing market when Pennington had some khaki pants embroidered with University of Virginia insignias for Bailes. “People just went nuts over it,” Pennington remarked. “We immediately thought about the collegiate market.”Since then, the business partners have created their own line of collegiate inspired pants, in a [...]
S. Denise Hoyle | November 28, 2008
Gerald Durbin is an avid Civil War re-enactor and former truck driver. During a downturn in his trucking business in 1990, Durbin’s life changed forever when he decided to make a replica shirt for himself because his wife was too busy to sew it for him. He found the pattern he wanted in a book, [...]
S. Denise Hoyle | November 4, 2008
Ruth Herring has designed and sewn clothing since she was in seventh grade and she has always dreamed of turning her hobby into a business. Unfortunately, Herring had been out of work since 1995 on a disability and had very little credit so she kept getting turned down for loans from banks. She didn’t give up though, [...]
S. Denise Hoyle | October 9, 2008
Even though many U.S. businesses are now manufacturing overseas to save money, some local Massachusetts companies are trying to buck the trend and revive the state’s once robust clothing industry.
The Fall River-based clothing design firm Karen Warren LTD. is one of them.
The clothing line is manufactured only in Massachusetts with labels that proudly proclaim ‘Made [...]
S. Denise Hoyle | September 5, 2008
When one door closes, as the old optimistic saying goes, another one opens. At least, so one hopes.
But sometimes it just doesn’t happen that way. And if another door doesn’t appear on the horizon, you might have to take a page from Christine Marchuska’s notepad and build one yourself.
When the economy took a serious downturn [...]
