DANIELLE DIFERDINANDO ALWAYS KNEW SHE WOULD BE A DESIGNER;
IT WAS JUST A MATTER OF MAKING THAT FIRST BIG SALE.
STORY BY Katharine Schildt Scrivener PHOTOGRAPHY BY André Chung
Most designers aren’t discovered in an elevator. But that’s just how Danielle DiFerdinando’s career began –
and she’s been on her way up ever since. When the Ellicott City native was interning at Bergdorf Goodman, one of the
store’s cosmetics buyers stopped her in the elevator to ask about the purse she was carrying – one the college student had made herself.
The buyer pressed DiFerdinando to make a cosmetics bag for the luxury department store, so she went back to her dorm room at the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) and came up with a prototype for a zippered pouch that doubled as a clutch. Danielle-Nicole Handbags was born.
DiFerdinando never looked back, and soon her bags were selling in stores from London to Japan. These days, her designs can be seen on the arms of such celebrities as Krysten Ritter, Alexa Ray Joel, and Anna Dello Russo, Vogue editor-at-large. They have even been featured on Oprah.
Homegrown Style
DiFerdinando, 26, embraced fashion at an early age. She remembers a pair of tie-dyed Guess jeans she had in the second grade. “I liked wearing the newest, hottest trends,” she says with a laugh. At school “all my teachers would ask if I could dress them.”
Her sense of style was influenced by her mother, Rita DiFerdinando, whose closet provided ample opportunities for a little girl’s fancy form of dress-up. “An Oscar de la Renta dress and a St. John’s suit were my favorites,” DiFerdinando recalls. “She had a lot of Bohemian dresses, but was always classy. She took the boho style and made it sophisticated.”
While she inherited her mother’s passion for style, DiFerdinando’s business savvy can be traced to her father. As
president and founder of Boardwalk Fries, David DiFerdinando exposed his daughter to business by putting her in charge of the Gaithersburg store every summer once she turned 16. “He taught me that you always have to work hard to get what you want,” DiFerdinando says.
She was also influenced by her teachers at River Hill High School. “Ms. (Zanouba) Stevens, my fashion teacher, taught me how to sew on the weekends,” she says. Stevens would invite DiFerdinando to her house where the two would create fashion accessories on a home sewing machine. Another teacher, Ms. (Teresa) Waters, says the former student, “motivated and pushed me to my limits by setting high standards to bring out the best.”
When it came to college, DiFerdinando knew just what she wanted. She’d fallen in love with New York during regular trips there with her parents, and loved the city’s energy, she says. She also knew that she wanted to be a designer, so moving to the epicenter of design made sense “I figured if other designers could make it there then I could, too,” she says.
While most of her peers enrolled in traditional liberal arts colleges, DiFerdinando decided on FIT, and hit the ground running. “Instead of going to football games on the weekend,” like her friends at the University of Maryland, she says, “I was in the sewing lab making handbags.” Through FIT she snagged a coveted internship at Bergdorf Goodman that involved three months in the buying office and three months in the personal shopping department.
From Ellicott City to Oprah
Even though DiFerdinando had never designed a cosmetic bag before, she didn’t shy away from the request. “I still remember what Ms. Waters told me on the last day of my senior year: ‘If an opportunity comes up, you always take it, Dani. Never look back.'”
Keeping that advice in mind, DiFerdinando went out searching for work space and was able to find a sample room across the East River in Long Island City, Queens to set up a small manufacturing operation. The first bags blended two types of leather, a buttery lambskin and a glossy calf – mixing colors like olive greens, grape, black, camel and coral for the two-tone purses, with patent leather and metallic trim piping. “I remember spending my Friday nights in the workshop helping sew, glue, paint, and tag the bags,” DiFerdinando recalls. “Each bag took around 10 hours to make from start to finish.” They sold at Bergdorfs for $170 each, she says, “and as more orders came in, the sample room grew.”
Once the cosmetic bags proved successful, Bergdorf agreed to take a look at DiFerdinando’s true love, her handbags. “A handbag can put a smile on your face and make you feel beautiful and confident, no matter your size,” says DiFerdinando.
What does Danielle DiFerdinando do when she comes to visit from New York?
Shopping: With mom at Nordstrom and Macy’s at the Mall in Columbia.
Eating: Cheeseburgers at Clyde’s.
Hanging: “I love to spend as much time as possible with my family since I don’t get to see them as much as I’d like. I also enjoy walking around old Ellicott City, especially in the fall and spring. It’s really inspiring with all the history and cute boutique shops.”
Pictured: the Sarah mini cosmetic bag Danielle designed for Bergdorf Goodman.
She continued designing bags, and the orders began coming in from other retailers, so Danielle-Nicole – following the lead of many high-end manufacturing companies – expanded its production to China, maintaining an office in Hong Kong.
Initially, the bags were made with expensive leather, and sold for $600- $1,000 each, but in 2009, responding to the downturn in the economy, DiFerdinando decided to lower the price point. Switching to non-leather materials, she was able to maintain the bags’ look and feel while keeping them affordable for women looking to be fashion-forward (with the added benefit of appealing to the many women in her young demographic who eschew animal products). Since then, DiFerdinando has kept the price of each bag under $100. They are currently sold at such retailers as Nordstrom, Macy’s, Piperlime and Cusp.
George Sakellaris, owner of Baltimore’s Handbags in the City – one of the first stores in Baltimore to carry Danielle-Nicole bags – says he was immediately impressed with the line. Her designs are “fresh and new,” he says. “The style and materials were different than what anyone else was doing at the time.
Even Oprah took notice. In 2010, O, The Oprah Magazine chose one of DiFerdinando’s styles to distribute to each of 5,500 guests at its O You! event in Atlanta. When DiFerdinando told the entertainment mogul she was just 18 years old when she started her line, Oprah’s response was, “You go, Girl!” For DiFerdinando, “It was a really cool moment,” she recalls.
DiFerdinando gathers a lot of design inspiration during her trips. She travels frequently to Paris, London, and even Austin, Texas, often using her phone to snap photos of styles she runs across. “The other day I saw a girl walking down the street and I loved the detailing on her sandals. So I took a picture of it and we’re using it on a handbag.” The resulting bag, made from artificial leather, has chunky gold hardware – also reminiscent of Hong Kong’s street style.
Lately, sleek silhouettes and colorblocking, a trend in luxury lines, have found their way into Danielle-Nicole designs. For the Alexa tote, one of her favorites (available at Nordstrom), DiFerdinando says, “we combined a few different ideas that we saw in luxury department stores in Hong Kong with the street style there.” The bag is color-blocked with two types of faux leather, one pebbly, the other smooth, and accented with brass hardware. “What I think makes the bag so special,” says the designer, “is incorporating two different styles into one piece.”
A hands-on manager, DiFerdinando has made it a point to learn about each step of the production and distribution process – from design and production to sales. “We all work together, but I have to know everything about each department so that I can lead my team,” she says. Her childhood in Howard County has helped her in the work environment. “Growing up in a diverse cultural community allowed me to learn how to adapt to different groups and work with different personalities,” she points out. “That’s crucial in the working world.”
DiFerdinando lives in Tribeca, a neighborhood in downtown Manhattan where old manufacturing and warehouse buildings began transitioning into lofts and restaurants more than two decades ago. She likes to start or end her work day with a class at SoulCycle – a workout that combines the intensity of spinning with some of the spiritual aspects of yoga (studios are illuminated with candles, to create what its founders call a “cardio sanctuary”). Evenings, she’ll grab a bite to eat at Eataly, a marketplace with food stalls, or get together with friends, many of whom also work in the fashion industry.
Bringing Fashion Home
What’s next for the 26-year-old designer? Ultimately, she’d like to see Danielle-Nicole become a lifestyle brand, with home decor and clothing lines, and she’s starting with jewelry and shoes. The company recently launched a collection of bracelets featuring the hardware used on the bags. DiFerdinando hopes to open her first Danielle-Nicole store within the next four years, and plans for the first to be in Maryland. That way, she reasons, “women who want to be fashionable won’t have to go to New York – I can bring it to them.”
And there’s no doubt the designer will have a great time along the way. “Work is play for me,” she says. “It’s who I am.”
Her advice for other young entrepreneurs? “Have passion for what you do. It takes a lot of time, energy, and work. And always believe in yourself. Don’t let anything get in your way.” *
