Street Art
Inspired by two best friends’ childhood memories, Zara Terez makes an imprint in the kids’ market.
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OMPROMISE HAS NOT only been key to Zara Terez and Amanda Schabes’ long-standing friendship, it is also the vessel for some of their brand’s most popular designs. Take their latest print described as “baby unicorns floating in space.” On the rare occasion when their ideas—like illustrated unicorns and photo-real images of space—don’t necessarily mesh on paper, the creative duo still attempts to combine them to create an out-of-this-world print. “And as it turns out, that print was one of the most popular at ENK,” Schabes, vice presi-
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dent of Zara Terez, notes. It’s topics like unicorns that Terez and Schabes bonded over as children in the ’90s and that now inspire the Zara Terez line of stretch leggings, skirts, shorts, dresses, hoodies and more for infants to girls size 16. Known for bold, whimsical graphic prints, the line has come a long way from the leather handbags lined with funky prints that Terez, president of the company, originally set out with in 2008. After graduating college, Schabes came on board for sales and the friends began to dabble in other products like printed pencil cases, which were immediately snapped up by Urban Outfitters and Neiman Marcus. “We got lots of reorders and positive feedback, and that’s when it became clear to us that something was working. We couldn’t come up for air,” Terez recalls. A year later she and Schabes put the leather line on hold to focus on the kids’ market. A pair of leggings with a universe print put the brand on the map. “It was impeccable timing because galaxy prints were trending in women’s, but we were the first to bring it to kids,” Terez explains. Today, 85 percent of the patterns featured in the line are unique to the brand, part of the platinum collection of original prints, which span the Manhattan skyline and subway maps to cheeseburgers and jellybeans. “It’s a lot more fun to see something come from our minds to the computer to the fabric and actually cut into a garment,” Schabes says. Spring ’14 will bring more food to the table, including Fruit Loops and Sour Patch Kids and multi-color paper clips, carnival landscapes and stacked friendship bracelets for their loyal summer camp crowd to collect. Wholesale prices for the tights range from $16.50 to $31.50. And in true New Yorker spirit, the ladies who grew up in Long Island’s Atlantic Beach and South Shore towns are determined to keep all elements of manufacturing—from design to material production—in the Big Apple. “We want to be a sustainable company—not one that is here today and gone tomorrow,” Terez explains. “We love what we do and we put a lot of passion in it,” Schabes adds. Their hard work has paid off, as the line is now in Bloomingdale’s, Nordstrom and more than 100 specialty boutiques worldwide. —Angela Velasquez
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8/19/13 4:47 PM