BY DESIGN – Tiffany & Sion Phillips

BY VAL SCHOGER; PHOTOGRAPHY BY ERIC MARCUS

Tiffany and Sion Phillips are the creators of the jewelry label URiBE. Multicultural upbringing, world travel and longtime working experience in the fashion and advertising industry reflect in their work and in creation of the brand. In just two years since its inception, URiBE has emerged from an idea to global recognition. URiBE jewelry is featured in magazines such as W, Vogue, Elle, and Harper’s Bazaar. A network of exclusive retailers around the globe carries the brand. What started out and continues as a love story has manifested into a successful business partnership.

URiBE is headquartered in London and, despite their full work schedules, Tiffany and Sion make time at least once a year to visit Tiffany’s parents, Ines and Dr. William Hargraves, in Panama City, Florida. “I have been an expat for 11 years,” Tiffany reminisces during our interview. After graduating from Bay High school, she studied at FSU in Tallahassee before receiving her MA in fashion design in Barcelona, Spain in 2004. An internship with the director of accessories of fashion house Chanel in Paris followed. Shortly after, she was offered a full time position on Karl Lagerfeld’s design team. Paris is where she met Sion for the first time. The couple shares details about growing their business and working close together.

PCL: How did you meet?

Tiffany: We met six years ago at a dinner event in Paris. We had mutual friends. It was just in passing, really.

Sion: I was helping a friend move back to London at the time. I worked as the art director of an advertising agency in Central London and Tif worked for Fashion House Chanel in Paris.

Tiffany: We met again one year later in London. One year after that I left Paris, Sion and I moved together in London and we started our own business after getting married.

PCL: What sparked your entrepreneurial sprit and the business idea?

Sion: Both of our parents have been working together in their own businesses. We both grew up with the idea. After about 10 years in the fashion and creative industry, we both felt we had gained enough experience and confidence to make our own business a success. I continue to work as a freelance art director for various agencies in London, and dedicate a lot of time to URiBE.

Tiffany: Our careers laid the foundation for URiBE. It was the time in our lives when we decided to take a risk. We always knew that we wanted to start our own business but did not know what it would be. We did our homework for about a year, found the manufacturers, etc. We literally started writing our business plan in 2013 when we were on our honeymoon. We traveled for 2.5 months from California to Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Peru to Chile, where my mother was born. Our travel experiences have influenced our brand and label. My mother’s maiden name is Uribe. With the marriage to Sion, the name “Uribe” would have fallen away from my paperwork. I realized that I could preserve the family name with our label. Sion loved the symmetry in the name and came up with the logo design.

PCL: Describe the concepts that you are applying to your business.

Tiffany: We create fashion jewelry as a high-end product. We want each object to look beautiful off and on the body. Our jewelry looks good on its own. I learned jewelry design at Chanel, from creating hand drawings to using Photoshop. I am very detail oriented and have learned that it’s all about the idea of collaboration. The world is much smaller now, which is a good thing for small businesses. We work globally in many ways with a production facility in Thailand. Our best customers are early fashion adopters in countries like Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, France, England, and American cities like New York and LA.

Sion: It’s about finding inspiration and tuning in and watching the scene and what’s going in in the world.

PCL: How do you work together in the business? Who does what?

Tiffany: The eccentric side of design comes from me. I like to combine different materials in the design process. The structural and graphic perception comes from Sion. He is influenced by architecture, sculptures, and has an eye for graphics. Ultimately, the URiBE designs are a mash-up of our two tastes. Both of our ideas meet, just like in a marriage.

Sion: Tif deals with the press and collaborates with the manufacturers. I am good in creating a strategy.

Tiffany: The best way to describe it is to say that I am looking at the trees and Sion is looking at the forest. I am a bit of a control freak. I remember every little detail and love the collaboration process. I need to know which stage of the production cycle we are in with every piece. This can be a weakness and it can be a strength.

PCL: What does the typical buyer or wearer of URiBE jewelry look like?

Sion: Often, they are the early fashion adopters, people who love design. It might surprise you, but we have a lot of male buyers who are looking for unique gifts for their significant other.

Tiffany: They are the people who “get” (understand) our designs and appreciate the intricacy.

PCL: Other than your own drive, what helped your success along and what are your intermediate plans for the future of your label?

Tiffany: Our parents provided tremendous support and we have friends in every corner of the world. Many of them are in the fashion or design industry. We try to surround ourselves with people we trust.

Sion: At this stage, I could imagine a design collaboration in the future with a sunglasses brand or maybe a furniture brand.

PCL: What advice would you give other couples if they were to decide to go into business together?

Sion: I would tell them to trust their instinct. A business should not be a vanity project. If we at any point discover that we are not having fun, then we will have to take a step back and decide to not do it.

Tiffany: Just talk about things, get it off your chest and it will make sense. Don’t let it bake or cook or whatever you want to call it. Get things out on the table. It is part of being passionate about things. Accept the fact that you are married to each other. We really love each other. It’s an adventure and that’s why we are doing this. We both made sacrifices to work together. We live in the moment and the number one goal is to keep moving forward, always.

Find out more about URiBE at http://www.studiouribe.co.uk/

 

[author image=”https://www.panamacityliving.com/media/2013/08/Val.jpg” ]Val studied communications and marketing in Germany and holds a marketing degree. She had a corporate career and has worked for nine years in media, PR and marketing internationally in Germany, England, the Caribbean and the United States. During an extended sailboat cruise n 2003, she traveled to the Gulf Coast and subsequently to Navarre, Florida and was immediately smitten with Northwest Florida. She started her first business in 2004 in Fort Walton Beach and as of July 2013, she became the sole owner and publisher of Panama City Living Magazine. She obtained her Merchant Mariner Credential (Captain’s License) right here in Panama City at SeaSchool and enjoys being on the water when she finds the time. [/author]