A Denver Handbag Haven Takes the City by Storm

Photo: Brooke Austin Photography

Beginning from a simple idea to create her own handbag in 2014, owner of BuxieJo Kerrin Pogozelski has taken Denver by storm with wild and adventurous handbag designs that empower women to feel strong and beautiful. We interview her to learn more about the ten-year journey.

1. What inspired you to create your own handbag in 2014?

My husband Ron was learning to make traditional men’s leather dress shoes by hand and had already bought a bunch of leather tools. We started taking classes to learn basic leather techniques together and I bought my first piece of leather to build myself a bag and sold it on social media before I was even finished. I made another, and that one sold, and that is how BuxieJo was born.

2. How did you and Ron meet and begin working together?

Ron and I met online before it was a really big thing and hit it off long distance. We texted each other for months before meeting in person, so it was like an old fashioned courtship, and it worked. Here we are 15 years later. Ron joined BuxieJo is 2019 after spending 20 plus years working in healthcare after his service in the Army. The timing was right, he joined the team, and has since created a few of his own shapes and size designs for BuxieJo. Now, we both travel to shows together, or sometimes separate, when we both have shows the same weekend.

Photo: Brooke Austin Photography

3. Have you always been interested in design/fashion?

No, not always. I lived in a ski town for many years and wore tech and ski gear in addition to athletic gear because I was always on the go. My personal style since starting BuxieJo has really evolved and now is pretty wild. I buy everything but a few pieces a year secondhand and create outfits as adventurous as our bags to express my personal style. I do not buy anything from fast fashion brands and if I don’t keep a piece for years, then I sell it on my neighborhood swap pages or donate it to a thrift shop. Being as mindful as I possibly can and sharing what I’ve learned about the detriment fast fashion has on our planet is very important to me.

4. What is the creative process like when creating your signature handbags?

I used to hand select every piece of leather and materials and made bags that resonated with me based on the shape of the piece. Now, because we have gotten so busy, and since Ron joined the team, it is a collaboration where we both pick leathers and fabrics that we love and then pick a day where we spread everything out on our studio floor and pair the cowhide fronts with the smooth leather backs and match them with a fun fabric for the interior. For my really special Signature pieces, I dig out scraps and leathers that I have (sometimes) held on to for years until the time is right for them to become something that gives with where my head and heart are at in that moment. Ron has started helping with these by adding free form stitching to attach the different elements to the body of the bag, and between the design and materials, and the stitching, each Signature piece is its own amazing work of art.

Photo: Brooke Austin Photography

5. Why is it important that BuxieJo empowers women to feel strong and beautiful?

Style is a wink to our personalities and I love being part of the voice our ladies communicate to the world! Buying a high-quality bag, or piece of clothing, that has some character and allows the woman to feel confident in her purchase and more so, in her personal style is the best thing any woman can do for herself. Women supporting my woman owned business one bag at a time has helped grow my confidence from a really shy girl, to a badass risk-taker that travels the country selling bags in new cities and meeting new friends and customers. When one of our bags can help do that for one of our customers, it makes us feel great too.

6. What’s been the best advice you’ve learned after 10 years in the handbag business?

Learning to have a thick skin and make just a few different shapes and sizes over the years has really helped point the way for our business. I made a few bags and listened to what ladies were looking for when they came into my booth at shows. Zippers on top, no black interiors, pockets on the inside, not too big, not too small, not too heavy were all things I heard over and over again. So we incorporated what we could and didn’t make things that didn’t fit into our more narrow focus, we don’t make dog collars for example, and just focus on making high-quality pieces that last for years and years.

7. Is there anything else you would like to share?

We hear all the time about the bags people with they had bought the first time they saw them. FOMO is real, and sometimes it takes us years to find the right hides to make a collection similar to one’s we’ve done before, so do not sleep on these babies. Treat yourself. Life is short, so buy the bag. Also, people ask us all the time, so we love letting people know that our name comes from combining our two middle names together, Kerrin Buxie and Ron Joseph, to be BuxieJo.

Photo: Brooke Austin Photography