Mega-retailer Urban Outfitters handpicked Vancouver designer Erin Templeton for a collaboration styled after one of her trademark boho handbags.
The Urban Outfitter’s adaptation of her purse – called Mountain Mama – is made in faux leather, which puts this vegan version at a significantly lower price for the retailer’s typically young, edgy customer.
“I had never done a vegan bag before,” explains Templeton.
Urban Outfitters picked up the Mountain Mama design – with its signature round bottom, lengthy straps, and relaxed feel – and turned out a vegan version in camel and black. The $60 bag is significantly less than Templeton’s $385 leather one.
“I think it’s a totally different customer to my customer,” Templeton says about Urban Outfitters’ version. “I feel like my customer might buy that for their daughter.”
Since 1999, Templeton has been producing leather goods from imported cowhides, locally tanned elk and bison, and recycled leather. She began making leather accessories while studying shoemaking at Cordwainer’s College in London, England. She continued to study leatherwork in Australia, and once home in Vancouver, started concentrating on handbags. By 2007, her studio graduated from renting the boiler room of a local tailor shop to the actual tailor shop, where she opened her studio/storefront.
Through the years, Templeton has developed a cult following of devoted customers and boutique-owners who carry her well-crafted works, but her latest venture with Urban Outfitters is paying off for the designer, who confesses that while she considers herself ambitious, she has never been “money-hungry.” The American retailer scooped up some of her leather goods after seeing her work at a trade show, and as a result, Templeton had one of her best seasons last year.
“It was because of the Urban Outfitters’ order, on top of my regular orders as well,” she says.
While Templeton isn’t motivated by a hefty paycheque, she wants to keep her operation of four full-time staff working.
“I want to get into a safe place,” she says simply, summing up her goal.
Having her work featured at Urban Outfitters has helped her get her name out not just globally, but it’s also raised her profile in her hometown as well. A modest and down-to-earth Templeton tells a funny story about a local woman who bought one of her leather wallets on the Urban Outfitters website. The woman showed it to her friend, who asked if she bought the wallet from Templeton’s store, which was just down the street. The woman had no idea that she could have just sauntered down the block to buy the wallet she had purchased online.
Templeton’s studio is located at 511 Carrall. Her website is ErinTempleton.com. To find the vegan-version of the Mountain Mama bag, visit UrbanOutfitters.com and search Erin Templeton.
