Meet Iwona Ash

Today we’d like to introduce you to Iwona Ash.

Hi Iwona, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Your bag tells more about you than anything else! It says what you do, where you are going, what your taste is like, your financial situation, your mood, your character, and your lifestyle. You can hide in your bag, but you cannot hide your bag from the world. It is out there!

Do you know how much the average working woman carries in her bag daily?

Bout 6 pounds plus the handbag!

Ten years ago, I got a fancy job, but to get there, I had to use public transportation and carry a staff for the whole day.

I needed a big, elegant, lightweight bag (I got scoliosis as a teenager from a heavy school bag), but everything I could find was too small, too heavy, or too expensive. I looked online, but the weight had never been included in the product descriptions. Because I had trouble finding the right bag for me; that’s why I started to design and make bags for myself. With time my project has expanded to making bags for my friends. Thanks to them, I could think of and develop bags for special needs and taste and test them. Along the way, I have learned a lot about myself and my preferences. I tend to love leather, but being a vegetarian myself, I had a moral issue with using leather. So, I started researching what kind of leather I could use for my work without harming animals and what I found entirely changed my perspective on leather. Once an animal has already been killed to produce food, its skin is merely a waste product that would be thrown away and therefore wasted. By using it, we are using the whole animal and not wasting this important resource. My moral issue was resolved, but myths about leather are strongly rooted in our culture, and that is why I seek to clarify this misconception. If anyone calls you Cruella Deville because of your leather purse, now you know the truth about how I source my leather!

I started the lightweight project eight years ago, and it usually takes about four years of testing and improving the bag’s design until it is ready for production.

My solution is to reduce heavy stiffeners and hardware to a minimum and to replace heavy leather with lighter but durable leather. All my bags are under 1 lb, sustainable, slow-fashioned, and made locally in Tucson.

When I had my first few models ready, I registered my company and started to sell.

Once, someone said to me that if people are willing to pay for your product, you have a business.

I don’t have a storefront yet but I am selling at street fairs, markets, and pop-ups in Phoenix, Tempe, and Tucson.

I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
No, it has not been easy. I have had to learn every aspect of the fashion business, and a whole new area “to learn” is opening with every step. You can predict problems from your own and other people’s experiences, but still, the situation is unique and has unique difficulties.

Also, the financial part of the business is like an egg and chicken problem; to sell, I need to advertise, but to advertise, I need to have an inventory, but to have the inventory, I need to sell to have finances to produce an inventory and promote and… I needed to brake the circle.

I worked like crazy, and I produced diversified inventory and went to street fairs to see what is selling. Then I made more best-sellers in the best-selling colors; that is how I have learned from my customers what can go to production.

The process is very demanding. It took me eight years to be where I am now, and still, I am in the beginning.

I spend almost three years perfecting the leather production to have something that is as close to perfection as possible and remade several dozen of bags and clothing because you won’t know if it works until you make it. They are no mistakes but a learning process and your ego get busted again and again.

Arizona has almost no fashion industry so to get the leather or linen I want I need to go to California or buy online. The same is true with production.

Generally, you have three components to a product: fast, good, and inexpensive, and usually, you can have only two of them at the same time. If you need fast and good, it will be expensive, etc. I chose to go on a good and slow road.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I have designed and made things since I was about two years old but my professional carrier has not had a linear path, mostly one thing led me to another. I got a degree from the Art & Design school in furniture design in Poland. Gradually I became a writer and journalist for radio, TV, and newspapers, but still active in Art & Design, I became an Art Director for International Design Festival “Design Attack,” curating exhibitions for Museums and Galleries. After moving to the USA, I began my career in Los Angeles as an acquisition buyer of movies for Film Production Companies worldwide.

I never stopped designing, so I created my own fashion company – Iwona Ash Design LLC, featuring a high-end line of handbags and accessories. I have an academic background in Art & Design, with a master’s degree in Sociology and Anthropology and post-grad Art Curating studies.

The truth is I always wanted to do what I am doing now, but I was afraid. A few years ago, I told myself, “now or never, it is your call. If you cannot make it, you will know that at least you tried”, so here I am, working hard, but this is what I want, and I love!

I have decided to do slow, sustainable, high-quality fashion using natural materials. The fashion industry become the second biggest polluter in the world.

There are no bags like mine on the market; soft, colorful, and lightweight, you can dress up or down with simplicity and variability.

I have been reintroducing traditional materials and fabrics in different design contexts, bringing hidden properties to the center of attention.

Life is fast for modern women. She must carry on daily tasks and be exposed to a diversified environment. Her needs to comfortably perform all her rules are often contradictory and/or unconscious, so she doesn’t know what she is looking for until she sees a solution, and here is space for my products!

When I am at the markets, I noticed that people could not pass me by without touching my bags and all my clothing. Sometimes I wish I had a hidden camera to record the expression on their faces when they feel the softness of the leather and I hear almost the same from every person; “it is so soft, buttery, light colorful” sometimes it makes me laugh to hear it over and over again. But I am super grateful for this experience. It gave me confidence in myself, my design, and my product.

The markets I’m going to attend:

What would you say has been one of the most important lessons you’ve learned?
Have a big picture in your mind but concentrate on small, everyday steps. Never give up because you don’t know how; just try. You don’t know what is a mistake and what is not until you try. I learned not to be afraid of failure, to be flexible, and to change as new knowledge reveals, listing to people, but to make my own decision; in the end, it is me who will have to deal with the results of the decisions.

I also learned that the lack of money is not an obstacle; it is an opportunity to be creative.

Pricing:

• Think: $364 for a leather bag is $0.30 a day for three years. How much do you spend on coffee monthly?
• The linen dress for $160 you will wear for the next 20-30 years

Contact Info:

• Website: https://iwonaash.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iwonaash/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/iwonaashdesign
• Other: https://www.pinterest.com/iwonaash/

Image Credits
Iwona Ash and Istvan Vizner