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about

Finding Enid with LOVE is a small enterprise based in Longmont, Colorado, that manages and curates a private collection of original pieces by Enid Collins (1918-1990), a mid-century handbag designer and entrepreneur whose name has become synonymous with the bejeweled box purses that made her a fashion legend in Texas, New York and beyond.

Mission: To facilitate extraordinary experiences through ordinary objects by collecting, conserving and curating original handbags and other physical artworks by Enid Collins.

Contact Karen Adler, Collection manager and curator

History

The start of something big: the collection’s first Enid Collins bags were featured in “Tramped”, a 2012 show at Karen Adler’s Manifest Art gallery, in Niwot, Colorado.

Finding Enid with LOVE site 2015 — Home page of the project’s first website, 2015.

Finding Enid with LOVE was founded by Collection Manager and Curator Karen Adler in 2012 to formalize her sizeable collection of original vintage box bags and other works by Enid Collins. She discovered Collins in 2011, when she stumbled upon a 1968 “LOVE” box purse in a Chicago shop selling high-quality mid-century items. Back home in Colorado, she sought out more box bags and eventually featured an exhibit of 60 at Manifest Art, her gallery located in Niwot, Colo. from 2010-2012. As she acquired and studied bag upon bag, her initial “purse anthropology project” evolved into a museum-quality collection. Applying her multi-disciplinary background in art and cultural anthropology, she began in earnest to collect and study as many original Collins works as possible.

While preparing for the Manifest Art exhibit in 2011, Adler went online in search of replacement faux jewels missing from her bags, an experience that ended up teaching her about the differences between the glass and plastic pieces Collins used in the 1960s and 1970s and inferior alternatives offered today. On Craigslist, she happened upon a motherlode of Enid’s gems, a shoebox-ful of more than 4,000 original faux jewels from the Collins of Texas factory, offered up by the grandaughter of a once-employee. Finding herself suddenly awash in gems she knew many Collins collectors were seeking, Adler launched an Ebay listing to offer the authentic replacement jewels she was accumulating.

In 2013, she began to digitally document the bags she repaired, “refreshed” and sold on Etsy in order to fund more acquisitions for the project. She quickly gained a reputation among collectors and resellers for expertise in authenticating and dating bags, and particularly for identifying and sourcing correct jewels and jewel patterns. In 2015, she published an online version of the collection to raise awareness of Collins as an overlooked fashion icon and provide an accessible resource for people seeking information about jewels, bags and Enid. By then, the collection had grown to more than 400 bags and had become a valuable, accessible resource for collectors new and old.

Today, the Finding Enid with LOVE collection includes nearly 2,000 original Enid Collins box, tote, leather and papier maché bags and other pieces, plus derivatives and archival materials such as photos, vintage ads and other documents. Through curation, study and circulation of Collins’s art, Adler continues to work to share the uniquely delightful experience that seeing a Collins bag evokes, and toward greater acknowledgement of Enid Collins as a significant American designer—with love!

Quick Facts

  
    Created:
    2012
  
    Location:
    Longmont, Colo.
  
    Founder:
    Karen Adler, M.A.
  
    Business type:
    LLC
  
    Collection type:
    Physical objects
  
    Collection size:
    Nearly 2.000 original pieces, samples and derivatives, plus archival documents such as period advertising, catalogs and photos. 
  
    Collection scope:
    Box bags, totes, jewelry and other works designed by Enid Collins from the mid-1940s to 1972. Also encompasses items by competitors, imitators and Collins of Texas designs after Enid sold the business to Tandy Corp.
  
    Bags restored:
    About 900
  
    First acquisition:
    "LOVE" 1968 square box bag, for $180
  
    Notable works:
    “autograph hound”, “forbidden fruit”, “green thumb”, “It’s a Whole New Sound” (with built-in transistor radio), “AuH2O” (Goldwater/Arizona), rare tote in leather and copper wire. 
Event and specialty bags such as “Fiesta Flambeau” (San Antonio festival), “Music City USA” (Nashville), “Palm Springs;” “Arizona;” and  “Winner’s Circle” (The Kentucky Derby)

    Oldest work:
    Hand-sewn leather barrel bag from the mid-1940s