Joëlle Nadine

From Versace to Joëlle Nadine

Handbag designer Joëlle Minassian has returned to Chicago to start her own company, Joëlle Nadine Designs, after working with some of the biggest names in the fashion industry, including Versace, Gianfranco Ferré and Roberto Cavalli. When it comes to getting what she wants, Joëlle says, “Luck favors those who create opportunities for themselves.”

Graduating from New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology, apprenticing for Joan Vass, then seizing the opportunity to work for celebrity designer Marc Bouwer, Joëlle still felt as if she wanted more. On a whim, the ambitious
designer set off to Italy for a three-week trip, hoping to get a job with a
world-renowned designer. Despite an offer for a design career at Gucci’s
London office, there were few job propositions. As a language barrier soon lead to several hung up phone calls and shut doors, Joëlle actually got up the nerve to call a stranger that she met while vacationing with her mother in Rio de Janeiro a year earlier. Luckily for Joëlle, the stranger happened to be the brother of a man who worked in the Versace factory. He remembered her from a year earlier and set up an “appuntamento” for her to meet with the head
designers of Versace. After sketching from morning to night inside a small room at the headquarters two days before she was supposed to come home, Joëlle was asked to work as a designer for Versace, a job many would die for!

Over the six-year period that she lived in Italy, Joëlle made a name for herself designing for Gianfranco Ferré, managing accessory lines at Just Cavalli and she taught one of the main fashion courses at the University of Rome.

Even though Joëlle had the opportunity to design for celebrities like Ivana Trump, Shania Twain, Pamela Anderson and Heidi Klum while working for Marc Bouwer in New York, she felt that her hometown Chicago was the only place that felt right to launch a line of her very own.

“I feel that Chicago has a really good quality of life. The people are genuine and not as “cut throat” as they are in other cities. A woman in Chicago wants good quality, but doesn’t want the same bag as every other woman in every other city. I make sure that all my designs are creative, but wearable. The handbags in my line include basic shapes, with really unique, novelty leathers,” said Joëlle Minassian of Joëlle Nadine Designs.

Bologna and Verona are among two of the styles in the fall collection. Named after the capital city of Emilia-Romagna in northern Italy, Bologna ($360) helps to portray a classy look with its sleek silver hardware and luxurious black stingray skin (also available in blue). Verona ($340) adds a mysterious look to almost any outfit, as it’s made of fine leather and adorned with a thin sheet of metal that has been embossed and antiqued.

Amazingly, Joëlle makes sure that each and every handbag in her collection is hand cut. Generally, only 30 cuts are made of the same style, which helps to insure that a woman will not be carrying the same handbag as the woman at the table next to her when she is dining out. The look of Joëlle Nadine
Designs is very contemporary and refined. Most handbags in the line are
natural colored and soft to the touch, with impeccable craftsmanship
of the hardware.

Joëlle Minassian has won two major awards within the past year, including a Best in Show award from Marshall Field’s Distinction in Design contest and the Fashion Group International’s Rising Star award for accessories. To find handbags from Joëlle Nadine Designs, please visit Elements in Chicago and Frances Heffernan and Perlie in Winnetka.
www. joellenadine.com
-D.V.