Annie's interest in fashion design began at an early age when she learned to sew at her grandmother's knee. She soon graduated to learning how to sew on a vintage Singer sewing machine. Initial projects were sewn for her Barbie doll and later, after a summer Singer sewing course, for her high school wardrobe.
In 1969, Annie
entered college as a Fashion Design major at a liberal arts college two
hours from her home. The college cancelled the major
during her sophomore year and unable to afford to attend a college far
from home, her dream of receiving a degree in Fashion Design was put on hold.
Annie decided to finish school locally, with a degree in Government and
Politics.
Shortly after college
graduation, Annie married and moved to New Jersey. She took
a job at the American Stock Exchange in Manhattan and later worked in the Options
division of the Exchange, training traders. She left the Amex in 1977 for her
new career as a "mom" when her son, Peter, was born in October of that
year.
The next years were spent
being a homemaker, corporate wife and mother. When her son entered nursery
school, Annie entered the workplace again, this time as a travel agent and spent
13 years in the travel business.
In 1993, Annie found
herself with a new challenge - being a single mom. In 1994 Annie purchased an
employment agency that specialized in placing travel agents. In the
fall of 1996, while visiting her son during parents' weekend at NYU where he was
studying Film and TV production, she looked around and realized that, while she
had raised him to follow his dreams and passions, she had not followed her own
advice. She immediately sold the employment agency.
In the meantime, Annie had
met and married the man of her dreams (they met on a wrong phone number ...
another story). She decided to help him build up his investment banking
business with the agreement that when it was successful, she could pursue her
own passion. Within a few years the business had achieved notable
success and Annie enrolled in the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising
in Los Angeles in the Spring of 2001. She graduated with an Advanced Degree in
March 2003, thus attaining that goal to become a fashion designer she had set 34
years earlier.
When the company was
founded in 2006, it began in an extra bedroom in Annie's home with Annie sitting
in front of her sewing machine, making each dress by hand. Seven years later
Annie Girl & Anna Elyse has recently announced the opening of their
storefront Flagship Salon and Design Studio in Old Town Pasadena, CA, which
marks the third physical expansion of their headquarters (not counting when we
took over the living room and dining room).
Annie Girl & Anna Elyse
dresses are all Proudly Made in Southern California.
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