of coffee when I began my business, so I wanted to create packages that would be affordable to help designers at the start of their journeys. BORO: How did you get started? Adriana Marie: It happened organically. I was a designer for my own clothing line for about six years. It was called Adriana Marie Co., and my customers shortened it to AMCO. Part of my business plan at that time was to create pop-up stores. This was a fairly new concept at the time. When the pop-up stores began, I was six years into my designing business. I was tired and doing everything myself, working 18 hours a day. I knew something had to give, and I stared losing the passion for the designing. I put up a popup store down on the Lower East Side, but it 22 MARCH 2 0 1 7 was very expensive, so I started to ask other brands to join me in the space. It was a huge success and on the back of that I was asked to create shopping events, and this time I was paid to do it! At the time I didn’t even have a laptop; I snuck into Hunter College to use their library computers! BORO: Do you just create shows at Fashion Week or do you run other events too? Adriana Marie: Outside of Fashion Week, we create pop-up stores so that the designers we showcase can get their clothing in front of consumers. Shopping online is all well and good, but you need to feel the fabrics and see the colors in natural light, not in a photo. We also create fashion shows for private clients. BORO: What did you study? Adriana Marie: Business and finance and then marketing and fashion design. I’ve had a lot of jobs in between. I was a bookkeeper, a waitress, a bartender, an ice cream seller — you name it. ARTS+ENTERTAINMENT
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