Today we’d like to introduce you to Virginia Guedes
Hi Virginia, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I started working with leather about 15 years ago. My, now ex, brother-in-law made medieval leather products and I found the tactile nature of leather very interesting, so I started making dog collars and leashes as Mojo Leather. When he decided to get out of the business, I bought him out, started making medieval goods, and rebranded as Skapa Leather.
When I moved to West Virginia and met my wife, Heather, I couldn’t have anticipated that she would have been all in when it comes to the business. Together, we have expanded our production capabilities and streamlined processes to be able to make enough product to attempt to meet demand.
Medieval leatherwork is an incredibly niche genre that is based in historical representations and a bit of fantasy. Our primary audience is renaissance festival patrons, which puts us in front of some of the most creative, fun people. Those people are the ones who have helped us grow into the business we are today.
We’ve had the opportunity in the last five years to move into new markets, purchasing permanent booths at faires in Maryland and Texas and vending in several other states.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
We’ve faced a lot of obstacles during our recent growth and we’ve had to be flexible and remain open-minded.
We were setting our stride and on an incredibly hopeful trajectory when the COVID-19 pandemic hit. All of the renaissance festivals were canceled and we had to pivot our focus. We made mask extenders to send to local hospitals and folks donated to keep us going with that project. We laser engraved cutting boards and other wooden decor items to expand our customer base and help keep us financially solid.
Since the pandemic, we’ve been catching up for lost time. Patrons are happy to be able to get back to faire and pretend the real world doesn’t exist for a few hours.
We’ve made some major investments and hired staff to help us with production and sales. With that comes its own challenges and we’re constantly working to make better decisions.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
Medieval leatherwork is fun because it’s both historically-based and creative. We’re able to recreate a pattern that was found in a historical site and bring it back to life with our own twist. The biggest thing, for us, is that people feel good when they wear our products.
How can people work with you, collaborate with you or support you?
We love meeting new people and are always open to ideas. The best ways to support us are shopping with us at faires or through our website, skapaleather.com.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://skapaleather.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/skapaleather/?hl=en
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SkapaLeather
