The Hidee bag is about to go big

When Cork-born, London-based accountant Caoilionn Hurley found that even her Prada bag couldn’t hold her heels on her morning commute, she was determined to find a way to ditch the canvas hold-all she carried each day for her shoes.

Handbag manufacturers told her it couldn’t be done, so she went to the London College of Fashion — and designed her very own high-end leather bag with a separate compartment for her shoes.

FIRST there was the Prada bag, a gift from her sons. It irritated her that such a high-end, top-notch bag still left her with nowhere to stow her heels on her morning commute. And she wasn’t alone. Everywhere Caoilionn Hurley looked — on the tubes, on nights out, at the races — there were women with runners or flats on their feet, with a canvas hold-all to carry their heels. The ones who did stash everything loose in one huge bag spent their time rummaging for keys or wallets.

She knew there had to be a better way.

So she approached handbag manufacturers. Her request was simple (or so she thought): she wanted a high end, leather bag, big enough to cater for her day-to-day needs with a separate, easily accessible compartment for shoes.

Each one of them told her it couldn’t be done.

“I’m very determined when I set my mind to something,” says Caoiloinn, 48, originally from the Model Farm Road in Cork and now living in London.

She laughs at the understatement.

“My husband always said, ‘I know you, you’ll find a way’.”

And find a way she did.

The final trigger was a snow-bound night in the car with her son. She was collecting him from university three years ago when the weather changed. It was a 60-mile journey, yet it took them from 4pm to 6am the next day to reach home. It was a trip that would change Caoiloinn’s life.

“He was very enthusiastic about my idea,” she recalls. “He talked about college friends carrying their heels in their hands, complaining. I got to thinking if I want it for work, and other people want it for clubs, well there’s a market there.”

She knew there was no bag that matched her vision on the market. And the top manufacturers had already told her it couldn’t be done.

So Caoilionn knew what she had to do — she would design the bag herself. She put to one side the fact that she had never sewed a day in her life, or her already successful, and very full-time career in finance. (A qualified accountant, with a law degree from University College Cork and a post grad in business from Dublin City University, she went on to become Head of Finance and Operations at the National Gallery in London.)

She would keep the day job going — and at the same time she would learn to sew.

“I was very determined, I knew it was a good idea. My handbags used to drive me crazy, if I needed anything from them I had to take everything out. I knew there had to be a better way — and if I needed it then others would too,” she says.

“How could you look elegant and carry a second canvas bag for your heels?”

So she bought a machine, contacted a woman who had recently made curtains for her home — and took weekly lessons from her, every Saturday morning without fail at 10am.

Next, she invested in a leather sewing machine and stepped up the training with classes at the National College of Fashion in London. She learned about patterns, and about gluing leather.

And then, one night at about 3am, she woke with a start. She had solved it — she knew how to make her bag.

“My father is an engineer back in Cork so I knew about function and form. It definitely helped me to figure how the mechanics,” she says.

“To create an unlined bag with an upper and lower compartment, I started with the idea that it needed a construction approach similar to a bridge. I attached leather panels, perfectly measured to mm accuracy, to each side of the bag.

“Then I had to secure them together with enough strength to carry the things women love. So I used weaved and locked the panels into shape with rivets.”

It was about 18 months after that snowbound evening. Incredibly, she drew her own patterns and again made her approaches to London’s top manufacturers. Finally she found one as passionate about the project as she was.

“I wanted it to be really beautiful,” she says, “with unlined leather so you wouldn’t have to worry if your shoes were wet. It could just be hoovered out. My spec was simply for a bag to have an unlined quality compartment. I wanted the colours, the design to be classic — black, greys and tan.”

Caoiloinn has succeeded where others have failed. Her Hidee handbags — named by a friend in Cork — match her spec to a tee.

Production began in September — and already the bags have been snapped up by some of London’s top boutiques, including Wolf and Badger and Pinstripe and Pearls. More recently stockists are emerging in China. The Hidee is about to go global.

And it’s no surprise. I gave the bag a trial run for this feature and it was a revelation. It was created for heels, a fact Caoilionn is anxious to stress, but as a mum to a baby and toddler, the heel compartment worked brilliantly as an all-in-one changing bag. Bottles and nappies fitted perfectly below in the bottom section, while my wallet, keys, diary and essentials sat in the main bag — and because Caoilionn’s design creates a flat surface in the main bag, there was no rummaging for lost keys anymore either. Or a cumbersome changing bag to drag around for once.

Caoilionn is proud of her Irish roots. She recalls evenings in Dick Macs in Dingle, with its small leather shop still on the premises (“I can still smell the leather”).

On her website she writes: “My family roots are in Clonakilty and Dingle, towns of heritage and culture in West Cork and Kerry. The majestic coastlines and dramatic scenery endure and instilled me with an appreciation of organic shape. Both towns are beautiful, with brightly coloured shop fronts looking onto the glistening waters of the Atlantic, they provided some of the colour influences for the development of Hidee designs.”

It’s no surprise an Irish stockist is a priority for Caoiloinn.

In the meantime the Hidee is available online, at www.hidee.net, ranging in price from £450. She is already working on a collection in fabric with a leather trim — it will also bring the price down.

Her passion has come at a price — she has invested over £50,000 in the business already and still keeps up the day job. But Caoiloinn has no regrets.

“I knew I was on to something so I couldn’t give up.”

We’re glad she didn’t.