Pierre Laborde works at a table every day that is against a wall connected to his kitchen.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a small room with endless possibilities. It\u2019s also the place where he creates what has become a social media craze. \u00a0<\/p>\n
What You Need To Know<\/p>\n
Pierre Laborde’s bags have become the talk of TikTok
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Lines form when he is at the Grand Bazaar NYC for a chance to get one of his bags
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He’s been making his handmade bags for nearly 20 years out of his Washington Heights apartment<\/p>\n
Laborde said he has at least 7,500 colors scattered about his studio. There are hundreds of templates stacked under a second table.<\/p>\n
There are also piles of colorful cowhide throughout the room.<\/p>\n
All of this is for one thing: making bags.<\/p>\n
Laborde\u2019s love of fashion is part of the fabric of who he is, back to the days he got his clothes from his parents\u2019 tailor growing up in Haiti.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery time they will make my clothes, I will alter [them] and change everything and make it my own,\u201d he said with a laugh.<\/p>\n
Laborde moved to New York and attended the Fashion Institute of Technology. After a few jobs in the industry, he launched his own company in 2008.<\/p>\n
\u201cI, as a creative person, I wanted to create,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Pierre Laborde bags are truly handmade. He cuts the shape of each bag, selects and precisely matches the cowhide and leather that go on it.<\/p>\n
At the sewing station, splattered with paint from over 17 years of work, he stitches the strap and paints it too.<\/p>\n
No detail goes unnoticed.<\/p>\n
For years, Laborde sold his bags at the city\u2019s oldest weekly shopping market: the Grand Bazaar NYC on the Upper West Side. \u00a0<\/p>\n
But that didn\u2019t always translate into sales.<\/p>\n
There were weeks he\u2019d sell one, maybe two, he recalled.<\/p>\n
\u201cI really, really, really I felt like it was over,\u201d Laborde said, thinking about the challenges from just even a few years ago. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n
But he said he never gave up. And in the fall of 2024, something unexpected happened.<\/p>\n
\u201cI knew the second that I saw his bags, just because his work is so amazing,\u201d remembered Grace Masingale, a social media strategist focused on fashion.<\/p>\n
She went to the Grand Bazaar NYC that fall and stumbled upon Laborde\u2019s bags, where she was the only customer at that moment, she said. \u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat immediately drew me was it reminded me so much of Tom Ford,\u201d Masingale said.<\/p>\n
But what they don\u2019t have are Tom Ford prices. Laborde\u2019s bags are hundreds of dollars, as opposed to thousands.<\/p>\n
So she went to TikTok with a simple request: \u201cI need everyone to blow this man\u2019s brand up.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her nine-second video has more than half a million views. \u00a0<\/p>\n
About a week later, she went back to her followers with an update. Laborde\u2019s booth was packed.<\/p>\n
The momentum only grew in 2025.<\/p>\n
More viral posts on TikTok lead to more buzz and more customers.<\/p>\n
There are weeks his bags sell out in about 30 minutes, according to Laborde. \u00a0<\/p>\n
One woman posted on Instagram that she woke up at 4 a.m. to get to New York City to buy one of Laborde\u2019s bags.<\/p>\n
Another woman on TikTok said she flew from Los Angeles and got in line so early that the Grand Bazaar wasn\u2019t even open.<\/p>\n
Lines wrap around the block before the market opens, solely for his booth.<\/p>\n
\u201cI still can\u2019t believe it. You know, in a million years, I will never expect anything like that will happen,\u201d Laborde said about the frenzy around his bags.<\/p>\n
The demand has become overwhelming.<\/p>\n
Laborde started distributing tickets in advance online to control who would be able to go to his stand to secure getting a bag. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Tickets that people even try to buy on Instagram.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s uncomfortable for me because I just feel like everyone deserves, you know, that kind of attention,\u201d he said, remembering the days from not too long ago when his stand would be emptier compared to other vendors. \u00a0<\/p>\n
During the holiday season, Laborde said he worked 100-hour weeks as he tried to crank out as many bags as he could.<\/p>\n
He said he could get 200 done a week, but to meet the demand, it would be about 1,500.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was working a lot, so I was like, I, I lost my appetite,\u201d Laborde said.<\/p>\n
He doesn\u2019t have a big studio or warehouse. His living room is partially decorated with finished bags.<\/p>\n
Also, in one of his closets, there are another 50 bags that are ready to be sold.<\/p>\n
Laborde is not looking to change much despite his bags being the talk of TikTok. He works at his pace.<\/p>\n
Customers are clamoring for his bags to be available online, but as his website states, it\u2019s a waiting list only.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou’re going to have to be patient,\u201d Laborde said. \u201cJust give me a lot of time.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
He said he is intentional about each step in the process, making his bags.<\/p>\n
Laborde said he even goes to vendors in the city to pick out each strap.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo me, it\u2019s like a child,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s why Laborde said he doesn\u2019t plan on mass producing, or changing his prices much. They are still from a few hundred to several hundred dollars.<\/p>\n
Because to him, this is more than just about money. This is his calling.<\/p>\n
\u201cMoney doesn\u2019t bring happiness anyway,\u201d Laborde said. \u201cYou could have so much money. And you\u2019re still not happy. So this is a passion. This is what I love doing. I love doing it because I see how people react to it. And so to me, it\u2019s just it\u2019s just \u2026 it\u2019s nice.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pierre Laborde works at a table every day that is against a wall connected to his kitchen. It\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":109045,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[2296,25,3801,231,75,84,83,9,24,12,63,27,200],"class_list":{"0":"post-109044","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-manhattan","8":"tag-app-human-interest","9":"tag-app-top-stories","10":"tag-eric-feldman","11":"tag-human-interest","12":"tag-manhattan","13":"tag-manhattan-headlines","14":"tag-manhattan-news","15":"tag-new-york","16":"tag-new-york-city","17":"tag-news","18":"tag-nyc","19":"tag-top-stories","20":"tag-vod"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109044","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109044"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109044\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}