About Enid Collins and Collins of Texas
The woman whose name would become synonymous with bejeweled box bags adorned with flowers, birds and other colorful creatures began her life on a farm. She was born Enid Roessler in 1918 in Shelbyville, Illinois, about 60 miles southeast of Springfield. When she was just an infant, her mother suddenly died, prompting her father, Philip, to take her to live with his mother and brother in town. While her dad hit the road to work as a farm-equipment salesman, Enid grew up in the small-town Midwest of the turn of the 20th century, a world that would later mark her style: carriages and steam trains, schoolhouse aphorisms and fairy tales, pussycats and the outdoors.
The family later moved to San Antonio, Texas, where Enid eventually studied fine art and fashion design at Texas Women's University. She lived briefly in Michigan after marrying Frederic Collins in 1941, but the couple came back to Texas after World War II and settled on a dream ranch near Medina, Texas. Improving the ranch and raising two children––Cynthia and Jeeper (Jeep)––Enid embraced a world of familiar subjects for her art, including horses, livestock, local wildlife and the lush landscape of Texas hill country.
Enid and Frederic Collins at work. (Photo: Jeep Collins)
The Collins of Texas factory, early version. (Enid is the woman with her back to the camera, sewing at the machine.) Photo courtesy of Jeep Collins.
In Enid, his 2021 memoir about his parents, ranch life and the birth of Collins of Texas, Jeep Collins explains that the now-famous haute couture handbags began as gifts for friends. Working at the kitchen table, Enid drew designs, Frederic cut leather and sculpted brass, and they put it all together. Fred sold the first Collins of Texas collection in 1946, to Neiman Marcus for $500. More orders followed, and soon enough even bigger success, when Enid had an idea for handbags from wooden boxes.
Frederic built a woodworking shop to make the boxes from exotic woods while Enid sourced faux jewels from Europe, Hong Kong and Japan. In 1956, they moved out of the kitchen and into commercial space in Medina. The first Collins box bags were manufactured by a staff of just 11, supplemented by little Jeep and Cynthia (who later became the original “Collins Girl” model in the company’s ads). In 1958, Collins of Texas incorporated and four years later built a 7,000-sq.-ft. factory with the modern equipment. Still, much of the work was done by hand, including application of the jewel patterns that were making the bags instantly recognizable, and coveted by patrons of the most fashionable boutiques. By the mid 1960s, Enid’s box bags were sold the world over.
After Enid and Frederic divorced in 1970, the company, which had relocated to Fredericksburg, Texas, was sold to Tandy Corp. Enid continued as head designer but left not long after. Tandy continued to produce Collins of Texas bejeweled bags, at first using Enid’s designs then switching to derivatives by various, unattributed designers. Today, Collins of Texas is once again privately owned by the Parstabar family and back in Medina, producing fine leather bags and a “Classics” line that uses vintage designs from its archive of Enid’s original drawings and patterns.
After leaving Tandy Corp., Enid semi-retired in Fredricksburg and continued to work as maker and patron of fine art. She died in 1990. Today, her designs are prized as important, original pieces of what Enid always told us that they were: wearable art.
Want to hear more of the story?
Read more about Enid’s family and the Collins of Texas backstory in Enid, the 2021 memoir written by Enid’s son, Jeep Collins. Find information about the book and where to purchase it at enidcollinsstory.com.
Jeep is a wonderful storyteller who shares information and anecdotes––plus entries from Enid’s own journals––on his website, jeepcollins.com.
