Congratulations on all that you have accomplished. You have done a wonderful job on your purses and all for a great purpose.Just wanted to tell you I always get compliments on your purses and how impressive and nice your web page is. Keep up the good work and I will continue passing out your business card.

—Christina M. Cladakis

I recently purchased my second Significant Journey handbag. I am so pleased with it that I had to write to you and let you know how impressed I am with your product. My new bag is the Heal Cloth Handbag. My other is the Hood College Handbag, which I share with my mother who is also a Hood graduate. I love the unique and beautiful designs of your handbags and the quality is excellent. I also love the fact that a portion of your profits go to charitable organizations. Congratulations on creating a wonderful product.

— Sue Jubinville (Hood ´74)

You should follow me on twitter here.

About Kathy Lengyel

As a young girl I loved arts and crafts so much I would experiment with every technique I could find. I also enjoyed fashion and sewing. My mom taught me how to sew at the age of 10. By my teen years I was making my own clothes and I knew I wanted to do something in the arts as a career. In college, I studied both interior design and visual communication arts and in 1981 I received my Bachelors Degree in Art.

After graduation I pursued a career in graphic design while developing a portfolio of artwork using fabric, thread, paint and other embellishments as my medium. In 1990, my art was featured in Step-by-Step GraphicsStep Inside Design) magazine for an advertising campaign for Thomaston fabrics. During that time, I received several other assignments for illustrative work from clients like Ford Motors, Honda Motors, Georgia Pacific, Publix Supermarkets, Florida Power, and Bank of America. My national breakthrough came from Berkley Publishing when they commissioned me to create 13 romance novel covers for their new “Romance in the Heart of America” series. The series become such a success for the publisher and spawned the careers of several authors that the series continued for several years with over 60 covers illustrated from 1990 – 1995. Several of the romance covers won merit awards from the Dimensional Awards Show, which selected the best in 3-D Advertising and Publishing Worldwide.

In the late 1990’s I developed a line of patterns and books for the home sewing quilt and embroidery market. I also designed two Signature Series embroidery design packages for Cactus Punch. Today I work for a marketing company that handles all advertising and marketing for several commercial distributors of decorated apparel equipment where I am responsible for all the creative concept designs and graphic print production. My love and passion for both graphic design and textile art continues and I hope to touch many people lives while I am on this significant journey.