If small businesses with big ideas are the next big thing in the luxury goods market, then Ireland's Florence-based handbag designer Pauric Sweeney will mop up, writes Deirdre McQuillan
WHEN it comes to bags, he's up there with Burberry, Bottega Veneta, Chloé and other high-profile brands, but the highly successful Irish designer Pauric Sweeney remains defiantly independent, one of the few lone players in the global luxury business.
His signature silver python bags, with their curvilinear shapes and bridle leathers, are some of fashion's hottest accessories and, as he says when we meet in Florence, "the more expensive the bag, the more we sell".
His bags have been shouldered by some of the most photographed women in the world, such as Kate Moss and Madonna. One was recently wielded by Lindsay Lohan to shield her face from the paparazzi. "It sold out after that," he admits.
It's a hot July day, but the city's leading retailer, Luisaviaroma, is already selling winter fashion where items from his collection are strategically displayed, alongside some of the season's key buys such as Rick Owens's zany leather and cashmere jackets. Further down the street he points to a bag in a window of another shop. "A rip-off of one of mine," he smiles.
Florence has been his home for the past three years and he has just moved to new premises, an old palazzo in Santa Croce in the city centre, overlooking its famous square and Basilica. Inside, the beautiful light-filled rooms with frescoed ceilings are home to his headquarters and studio. Tribal bags, stuffed animal heads, floor-to-ceiling shelves with books on art and design share space with racks of bags and all kinds of hides. The smell of leather is pervasive.
Previously based in London where he initially established his name as a fashion designer, Sweeney moved to Italy with his Japanese wife Maki shortly after the birth of their son Oscar to be close to the most famous tanneries and leather workers in the world. Since then, he says, "growth has been phenomenal. We are in 180 stores all over the world - Africa, India, US, China, Europe and Japan." Now producing 10,000 bags a year with a multi-million annual turnover, it's a far cry from the days in Hoxton where he started with a dozen bags "sewn by Bangladeshi sikhs on the Bethnal Green Road".
As his reputation spreads internationally, his life has shifted into a higher gear. When we met he had just returned from Paris selling his cruise or pre-collection which now represents 80 per cent of advance business.
"It's the most important collection because the products enter the stores in November and stay until June, so it's a long season. It's all about early deliveries and each season it's growing bigger."
His business acumen is as sharp as his design sense, an attribute he credits to his Blackrock College education.
Sweeney, who was born in 1973 in Falcarragh, Donegal, says he always had a creative side. His father who owned a general drapery in the town died at the age of 47 from cancer when Sweeney was only six, and his mother ran the business until the three children were grown up. After school, he trained briefly as an architect in the US, but returned to Ireland and designed furniture, later leaving for London where he set up a gallery in the Truman Brewery in the now fashionable Shoreditch area of the city.
He initially started designing clothing and only started to add bags later on. "[Making bags] was much more hands-on and composition based and was a whole other approach to channelling creative energy. From a timing point of view it worked very well. At the time brands were reaping the rewards of accessories. There was a gap for niche brands to take off," he recalls. Success in London fuelled by influential press enthusiasm was followed by a debut in Paris and increasing sales.
Ensuring quality became paramount. "The main purpose of living in Florence is keeping an eye on what happens from a product point of view," he says.
Each collection starts with the materials and, coming from the most advanced tanneries in the world, he has a vast selection on his doorstep from which to choose - sting ray, lizard, printed, quilted or patent leathers, laser-etched sheepskin, python and crocodile.
"The croc skins come from Australia and alligator from Louisiana, but the hurricane put the price up. The python is from Indonesia and protected by the Washington Convention," he explains.
Over 25 styles and shapes can be varied in appearance depending on the materials used. Many are hand-finished. His combinations are fresh and imaginative and not weighed down with unnecessary hardware or flashy logos. In his current collection, the "Memphis", with its graphic shapes and exuberant patterns, took its inspiration from the famous design group. Trends in furniture design are an influence.
Increasingly being sought after as a design consultant, Sweeney has many projects in the pipeline, having turned down lucrative offers such as heading up Dior accessories, for example, and a big US brand.
"I have my own rapidly growing company and it would have meant closing it down," he reasons. He has, however, accepted the challenge of revamping Todds, a luxury Italian global brand based in Ancona known for quality and craftsmanship; his first collection for them will debut in September.
For him luxury has other meanings.
"It isn't about fulfilling an ambition, but it's about time spent and how you conduct your life and the decisions you make."
Other projects include creating a limited edition bag for Swarovski, setting up a joint venture in Japan for a second line of bags and accessories at lower price points for the global market. This will see the opening of Pauric Sweeney stores in Japan and Paris, and 30 leading department store concessions within the next two years. Shortly, he will be going to Korea to discuss a luxury venture with the Galleria department store in Seoul, one of the three key retail players in Asia.
"Seoul has an otherness," he says, "it's at a crossroad between the creativity of Japan and the work ethic of China." That store will open in December.
His mobile never stops ringing. He's just been in Bombay doing an interview with Vogue, was in Shanghai six weeks ago both "incredible growth areas", has been six times to Japan already this year and to Indonesia on a research trip. During the day it became clear that he is far more enthusiastic and energised discussing design concepts and international art and furniture trends rather than pedestrian talk about clutches and holdalls.
"I am not crazy about bags," he admits. "I have a great deal of reluctance about what I do. There is so much input and the process has to be the most important part of it."
But the merging art and fashion worlds are drawing him in and as he says "fashion structures are now part of the art world".
Success has enabled him to buy a place in the foothills of Fiesole as well as an old mill in Wexford near his mother which he is currently restoring. Dressed in shorts, a black polo shirt, flip flops and dark glasses with slicked back hair and a Marlboro at the ready, he cuts a patrician, languid figure at variance with what must be a demanding work schedule. Living in Florence, he says, has its benefits, but its drawbacks too and he admits that running a business in Italy is difficult.
"Obviously this place is very beautiful and has its history, but the zeitgeist was 500 years ago. Unlike London there is no contemporary arts scene, no music scene, no creative energy. But pursuing quality has driven the business."
If small businesses with big ideas are the latest trends in international luxury, Sweeney is certainly benefiting from playing the game to his own rules.
Pauric Sweeney bags can be found in Harvey Nichols in Dundrum and in the Design Centre, Powerscourt, Dublin