How the Coach Handbag Emerged
Coach set out as a family-owned business enterprise in a loft in Manhattan, New York in 1941 with American fashion designer Bonnie Cashin. In 1960, Miles and Lillian Cahn, proprietors of a wholesale purse manufacturing business, asked Cashin to become designer of a projected retail collection. As Cashin was initially too engaged with other designing contracts, she did not become their designer until 1962.
In producing accessories for her style of modern dress, Cashin dramatically converted handbags with designs similar to modernistic sculpture, dyed in candy colors of pink, orange, yellow and blue, and bordered with linens fashioned by textile designer Dorothy Liebes. With a larger assortment of shapes, colors and textures in her "Cashin-Carry" designs, several featured spacious openings or outside coin purses and pockets. Coach Incorporated is now believed to be a very "fashion-forward" brand and is typically sold and purchased throughout the nation.
Cashin designed coordinated shoes, pens, key fobs and eyewear and added hardware to her clothes and accessories alike, in particular the silver toggle that became the Coach hallmark, and amazingly enough had been inspired by a memory of promptly securing the top on her convertible sports car.
The Coach purse has become one of the most popular brands of designer handbags on the market today. Even in a poor economy, the Coach line survives as a quality product among both young and mature women.
Do you have a favorite Coach purse? What is it about Coach handbags that you enjoy most?