Photograph by Jacqueline Ramseyer
Carry Alls: Willow Glen resident Celina Travis, 24, holds up the custom-made handbags she is marketing under the name 'Celina Lora'. A self-taught designer and seamstress, Travis uses velvet, silk, chiffon and organza fabrics to make her one-of-a-kind creations.
Designing woman runs own handbag-design business
By Amy Jenkins
Fabric plays a large role in Celina Travis' life, whether she is dyeing, sewing or manipulating it in her own unique way, all in order to make her custom-made handbags, what she calls "little gems."
Travis, 24, has lived in Willow Glen her entire life and began making purses three years ago, but it wasn't until a month ago that her business "really took off," she said.
Art wasn't always Travis' forte. She graduated from San Jose State University with a degree in speech communications in 1999 and had planned to attend law school. She said she had always been academically motivated, but her interest in art grew when she took a ceramics course. She took the class during her senior year because she was finished with classes for her major, was injured from playing water polo and wanted to take some fun classes, she said.
"The ceramics class changed my life," said Travis, who has three sisters and has lived in the same house with her family since childhood. "I took two more art classes the next semester; it was all I could think about."
Before she delved into the handbag-design industry, Travis learned how to sew from her mother. She began sewing clothes for herself but never intends to sell clothing, she said.
After graduating from college, Travis took a few semesters of fashion design courses at West Valley Community College and then studied design at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York for one year. She mostly used leather while designing there because it is readily available in New York, but it is too expensive and not appropriate for warm California weather, she said.
Instead, her purses are made out of silk, chiffon, velvet, crepe and myriad other elegant fabrics. And those are just the summer purses.
For winter warmth she uses wool, cashmere, angora and mohair, or "anything I can get my hands on and I like, that is of good quality and soft," she said.
The purses are so unique that no two are exactly alike, and each is numbered for originality. She said her inspiration comes from other artists such as Betsy Johnson. Right now she has between 50 to 75 purses on hand, ready to sell, and is constantly taking new orders from regular and new clients. To get her name out to the public, her work has appeared in boutiques from Los Gatos to Eclectic Touch on Lincoln Avenue.
Travis describes the bags as, "colorful, bright, California-type purses." Some are embellished with flowers and others with monograms or fringe. Since Travis makes, designs, dyes and sews each purse herself, each takes between 12 and 14 hours to assemble. If she is lucky, she can make 10 purses a week, she said.
She makes use of a new technique of bunching and gathering material in a way different from that used by most designers. The top-secret process she invented involves making tiny squares on the purse, and she is going to have the technique patented.
"I've never seen any done this way; it's really new," she said. "I think this is why they have taken off."
The line includes everything from small evening bags made of velvet and beads to large totes to walk around with everyday. The designs please all ages and tastes, she said, and she offers a younger "funky" line and a "stylized and sophisticated" line.
"I like to use bright colors that pop and sizzle," she said. "I am working on a new club line that will come out in January, which can attach to a belt loop and hold lipstick and other things. It will be slimming, shapely and feminine."
To find out more information or to place an order, call 408.394.7217, email sweeet2@aol.com or visit www.celinalora.com. Celina Travis will hold a sale at her house, 990 Michigan Ave., Dec. 16 from 2 to 6 p.m.
Willow Glen, California Since 1992
