About Skye Lee ...
Smart design is a powerful way to improve daily life. So it’s not surprising that Skye Lee’s debut laptop bag isn’t just arm candy, but highly functional: Lee’s background is a unique marriage of high tech development and fine arts, with an unwavering focus on people-centered design. As a result, her first foray into fashion displays the elegant simplicity that comes from a true understanding of how things work – and a passion for making them work beautifully.
Lee, 33, discovered her talent for the visual arts early on. She left her native New York as a teen to attended the pre-college program at the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) and went on to study both fine arts and graphic design at Carnegie Mellon. After earning her BFA in Design, Lee began her career as a graphic designer at WWD where her love of fashion blossomed.
“At WWD, I found inspiration in designers that created for real people, not just fashion models,” says Lee. “People like James Perse and Daryl K who designed clothes that were wearable and comfortable, as well as stylish.”
In 1995, at the height of the dot com boom, Lee was recruited for a spot on IBM’s stellar creative team in Northern California. She headed west, and became part of the vibrant tech and creative community that was helping craft the look and feel of the Web, then only in its nascent stages. Lee went on to work at such pioneering Web companies as Netscape, Adobe Systems and Sun, and ultimately helped usher in one of the Web’s few IPO success stories as Vice President of Product Design at PayPal (now an eBay company).
“At PayPal, my goal was to design a product that was innovative as well as user friendly,” says Lee. "One of the biggest reasons for our success at PayPal was that we listened to what people wanted. I’ve taken that approach with my own designs – asking my customers what they look for and need in a laptop bag”
Now, with the debut of the stylish Gracie and the launch of her own design company, Lee is putting that experience to work on her own creations. She’s also able to pursue a few of her other passions, like snowboarding, yoga, and mentoring fellow entrepreneurs as a leader of “Ladies who Launch,” an organization that champions women in business.