At 17 years old, Conna Walker not only had school work and the stresses of teenage life to deal with, but her own business to run too.
Using her parents’ background as market traders for inspiration, she started buying and selling dresses online, before branching out into designing her own pieces.
Conna noticed a gap in the market for designer-inspired party clothes that were better quality than the items on offer on the high street.
Now 26, the Brit is the CEO of House of CB, an affordable luxury fashion brand with collections that are designed in-house and sold around the world.
Conna on her parents’ market stall in Dalston, east London
“My parents were market traders and I would go with them to Ridley Road market in Dalston,” Conna tells the BBC.
“My dad is a hustler, they’ve taught me in that sense, but no-one did fashion in my family, that was something new.
“Originally I didn’t have a business plan. I wasn’t trying to do anything specific as such, my dad was just like, ‘You need to get a job’, and then I didn’t feel like doing a nine-to-five.
“So I started buying and selling ready-made pieces and I was at school at the time so I put them on eBay.”
Conna says her days would consist of putting up listings, going to school, then coming home and answering questions and packing up orders. But it wasn’t until she started making her own designs that her business really took off.
“It came from me wanting specific things that weren’t available in the market place, so I set up my own website, as there was only so much that ready-made products could do for me and there were pieces I wanted made,” she says.
“It was stuff I wanted as an 18-year-old that wasn’t available, it was a trendy item of the time and the brand still has that feeling about it.”
Kylie Jenner, Beyonce, Jennifer Lopez and Khloe Kardashian in House of CBOne of House of CB’s biggest selling points is the celebrity following it has attracted – Beyonce, Rihanna, Kim and Khloe Kardashian, Kylie Jenner and Jennifer Lopez have all been spotted in Conna’s designs.
House of CB’s clothes vary in price, but her key pieces, like dresses and jumpsuits, sit around the £100 mark – considerably cheaper than a lot of big fashion brands.
“I remember when J-Lo first wore something – I literally squealed,” she says. “I wasn’t expecting it and it had a huge impact on us.
“It took a few more placements after that for people to start really being like, ‘Oh, they are being worn by those celebrities’, because so many brands were like, ‘Get the look’, but we were really being worn by them.
“We don’t pay for placements so for us it’s flattering when [celebrities] wear something, because they’re choosing to wear us over items that cost thousands of pounds.”
BBC
