hard work pays off

Yesterday was an AMAZING day--we got an email from the buyer at Henri Bendel asking us to start planning a trunk show with them. We are so excited because at the Open-See on Friday we were told it could take up to several months to hear back, but 3 days is much better:) We also had a really great call with a Casting Director for a TV show (we will keep you waiting to know which one) and we made it through to the next round! We don't want to get our hopes up too much because there is still a ways to go before we officially make it, but keep your fingers crossed for us:) AND yesterday we found out that SAKS is interested in our jewelry and wants to see it! It finally seems like hard work and patience is paying off. We couldn't have made it here without our amazing family, friends, and stella valle fans...so THANK YOU so so so MUCH!

And on to the fun part--NEW DESIGNS!! Here is a new ring of ours that we just received a sample of and are OBSESSED with!! Our inspiration for our new designs coming out is art deco inspired. We are really focusing on designing and think you all are going to love some of our new pieces in production! So continue to follow and continue to spread the stella valle word:)

Henri Bendel Open-See

What a Friday Ash and I had! Henri Bendel had their bi-annual open-see to call all designers who would like to pitch their line to the buyers. We arrived Thursday night which was a gorgeous night in Manhattan and picked some of our favorite pieces from our spring 2012 collection and a few from our fall 2012 collection coming out. The line began to form early Friday morning and by the time we arrived at 9am it was around the block. We stood in line for about 2 and a half hours. Eventually it was our turn!

We had a great pitch and the buyer loved our story and our jewelry. She asked if we would be interested in having a trunk show at Bendels! We can't wait to have stella valle rocked in their store on Fifth Avenue :)

 Henri Bendel Flagship Store- Fifth Ave, NY, NY

 The line has formed!

 Ash and I after they asked us to have a trunk show in their store:)

ABC News and a Radio station were there.

trunk shows, trunk shows, trunk shows!

Good Morning! Not much going on this week except trunk shows! I had one Monday night, another one last night, and have one tonight all in Connecticut. I have my first one at Lehigh University on Monday then travel to Savannah for another 2 shows next Thursday and Friday....WOW!! If you are interested in hosting one with your friends and family to receive free stella valle jewelry just let me know. I am having a blast meeting everyone and it seems that they are having lots of fun creating their accessories!

On Friday Ashley and I will be in NYC at the Henri Bendel Open-See pitching our jewelry again to the buyers. Hopefully this gets the ball rolling for our trunk show there that they asked us to do back in October at the last open-see. After that we will be in the city for the day letting our creative juices flow to get some great materials for designing. This is what Ashley and I LIVE FOR!!!  Stay tuned to see what we pick up!

fascinated by fascinators

Good Morning! Hopefully I can brighten your Monday morning by a few funny pics from the weekend. On Friday my friends flew in from Savannah for a wedding at West Point, but first we stopped in NYC. As I told you, we are working on a swimwear collection and had to get some materials for our prototypes. Side tracked as usual, we came across materials in a few stores to make our own fascinators for the wedding. So we did just that! Look at the goofy pictures of us with them on.

picking out our fascinators

got our feathers!

nyc pizza break...of course!

                                                                    love our creation!

                                                       pumping gas in my little top hat;)

soldiers' got style

Dulce Candy, former Soldier, like ourselves was named beauty blogger of the moment! I love following her and most of all we love when she wore stella valle's blue silicone marla bracelet in Regard Magazine:) army past, fashion future.

dare to be different....STUDmuffin NYC

When I was managing Gaga's Workshop at Barneys New York I had the privilege to work with such young, talented, artistic people. One of my favorite associates was Kyle Brincefield, owner and designer of a line called STUDmuffin NYC. During Kyle's time at Gaga he had a big hit that landed him in his first retail store, Patricia Fields. Immediately his clothes sold like crazy in there and he can barely keep them on the shelves. I absolutely love Kyle's work and can't wait to get my own STUDmuffin attire! I love other entrepreneurial designers doing their thang;) Dare to be different!

Check out some of my favs!

for custom orders email Kyle at kbrincefield11@gmail.com

on the road

It's been an eventful couple of days and I haven't been the best at blogging, but I'll catch you up quickly! We had such a fun time at our trunk show this Saturday in NY and absolutely fell in love with the girls from Hoffstra. They sent an email today letting us know that they all rocked their stella valle jewels out Saturday night and that makes us sooo happy!! Here are a few pics from the evening!

After the trunk show we traveled down the shore to enjoy a beautiful Sunday there! We ran 6 awesome miles along the beach and it felt great:) I even got to see my Godson Christopher and he enjoyed getting pushed around with the wonderful salt air breeze!

Today was sooo fun--I got to visit 2 of my favorite stores and owners in Jersey--Suite 201 & Pink Jewels! They have the latest stella valle spring 2012 collection and it is selling quick:) I LOVE my JOB!!

 

Lipsy London!

Yesterday was a great event at Bloomingdale's. It actually turned into a possible large opportunity for stella valle:) Lipsy London is UK based store, but has a flagship store in Bridgewater, NJ inside Bloomingdale's. I was fortunate to meet the East Coast Manager who wants to feature us in their store. Hopefully this could lead to stella valle branching into the UK?! One of our goals for 2012 was to gain an international foothold...could this be our chance??? NOT sure, but we will make sure we keep pushing!! 

inspirational sayings that we live by...

bloomies

we just heard back from bloomingdales and we are starting the planning process for our event! this is so exciting, we get giddy inside:) hehe. today i'm going to an event there to meet stylist Samantha Brown styling people with the latest Aqua looks. I'll post pictures tomorrow! Hopefully we'll get a date soon for our trunk show and we want to see you all there!! 

photo fun

we had a photo shoot to show our new spring 2012 pursuit of natural happiness collection. 

enjoy the pics and let us know what you think!

 

stella valle swimwear?!

good morning! usually I am not a fan of monday mornings, but I'm excited today because I'm going to ashley's to work on more designs.  i found this really cool bead store this weekend in downtown charlottesville and bought some great things to start playing with to help our creative juices flow;) we just received pictures this morning from our manufacture with 2 of our new pieces in production and they are looking adorable! we will have samples in hand early next week and can't wait to share with all of you! 

so we have some exciting news...stella valle is EXPANDING!! at the end of last week we teamed up with my best friend (super creative) to start our swimwear collection! we finished our first prototype and it is looking great:). in 2 weeks she is flying in to hit up nyc with me to find the coolest patterns around. stella valle swimwear is going to be nothing like you've seen on the racks before so get pumped!!

i wanted to share this pic with you because i was dying when i saw it. this dog was sitting in the car rocking sunglasses. i love how owners think their dogs are humans...me included! haha.

 

how to sesh

since it's friday and i've gotten tons of texts/posts/requests for the shorts i made, what better time to give a how to sesh for a fun weekend activity. plus i think it's suppose to rain saturday morning so what perfect timing!

1. find an old pair of jeans that you don't wear anymore, a darker blue wash is best and cut them to your length of choice. i like mine a little shorter;) save the legs because you never know what project we might think to use them later!

2. fill your sink or a bucket with a small amount of bleach. dip your shorts into the bleach for about 30 minutes or until you see the wash lightening. you might need to rub the jeans to get the die out. leave the top of the jeans a little darker for a fun wash effect.

3. wash your jean shorts and enjoy how cute they already are! 

4. buy fabric paint and a paint brush at micheal's or an arts and crafts store. it only cost me $3 so you don't need anything fancy and start painting!

5. to look even hotter, pair your shorts with some of our favorites--the shiloh double wrap bracelet, a create your own bracelet, the gold peachy keen queen necklace, and the gold hippie harmony ring! rock them hard ladies;)

enjoy and have a great weekend;) 

the creation

one of our most asked questions is where does the name stella valle come from?! we love the meaning & memory behind our company name so we wanted to share it with everyone today:)

it’s almost 3 years ago now that ashley and i started to brainstorm about opening a company together. at the time ashley was living in dallas and i was in nj. i found this adorable french bulldog puppy that I wanted to adopt from oklahoma so of course i made some grand old plans to fly into dallas and then drive 4 hours one way to get the pup. ashley was totally in on the plan. we decided that this was a perfect time to discuss the foundation and name of our company. we set some requirements for our company name—1. we wanted it to sound like a person’s first and last name, but not our names 2. we wanted it to have something that we shared in common and 3. we wanted it to incorporate a meaning/memory that we both cherished.

with those 3 requirements in mind we started thinking. we decided that the thing that linked us together all our lives was our last name—dellavalle. we knew that this trip would be a memory that we would never forget and loved how it was the very beginning to the start of a wonderful thing. ashley and I decided that we would name my pup stella. we combined stella and dellavalle to come up with stella valle which successfully accomplished our first requirement to sound like a person’s name. 

that trip is a memory that both ashley and I cherish and laugh about today. it reminds us often of how far we've come and how much we've learned along the way to becoming the company stella valle is today. not to mention we are still scared from stella’s horrific gas the entire ride home. 

some pics from that day we picked up stella!