Sarah's Bag
Sarah's Bag is feminine, fresh, and fashionable. It is full of life and down to earth. It is distinctive, vivacious, and elegant with a touch of retro glamour and a street-wise sensibility. It is modern with a memory of what made our ancestors beautiful. It is stylishly aware and socially responsible.
An intimate line of handcrafted, custom-made women’s fashion accessories, Sarah’s Bag began in 2000 as a modest collection of handbags. Over the past five years, it has expanded to include beach totes, evening bags, clutches, and satchels, along with shoes, scarves, sashes, belts, bangles, and beaded necklaces. Each piece requires 10 to 15 days of meticulous embroidering, beading, crocheting, and hand-stitching to produce.
Sarah’s Bag recognizes that every woman is unique and responds by creating designs that are equally original. The company owes its success to every woman who wears, makes, supports, and contributes to the story of Sarah’s Bag.
Our Story
Sarah Beydoun is the founder and creative director of Sarah’s Bag. Born and raised in Lebanon, she belongs to a generation of Beirut-based designers who came of age during the country’s fifteen-year civil war and are now contributing to rebuilding the city’s cultural life through their work in various creative industries.
After studying sociology at the American University of Beirut, Sarah earned her master’s degree from the Universite Saint Joseph, where she wrote her thesis on female prostitution and women prisoners in Lebanon. She realized she could combine her interest in bettering underprivileged women’s lives with her love for fashion. In doing so, she created a robust young business that is stylishly aware and socially responsible at the same time.
Sarah decided to set up her company as part of a rehabilitation program, whereby women at risk from economic depravation or the stigma of having served time in prison would learn valuable skills in return for a reliable income and a stable source of pride, dignity, and empowerment. In the process, these women would be helping to revamp the centuries’ old traditions of artisans and textile makers in the Middle East for the purpose of invigorating contemporary fashion. The arrangement turned out to be successful, innovative, and highly efficient.
As the company expanded, Sarah teamed up with her friend Sarah Nahhouli. By 2003, Sarah’s Bag had outgrown its workshop in Horsh Beirut and moved to its current showroom nestled into the high-ceilinged, tile-floored rooms of a beautiful old building in Gemmayzeh, a neighborhood near Downtown Beirut that is a mix of antiquated cosmopolitan charm and youthful urban energy.
