The Betty Blog » David Pu’u

Meeting Icons, a Designer, a Luau and Art: A Day in the Life of Betty

donna — Sat, 10 Sep 2011 15:56:48 +0000

Wow, it’s not every day the founders of Surfaid International walk into your shop.

What an honor it was to meet Dr. Dave and Randall! Surfaid has been one of my favorite orgs to give to over the years for the amazing work they do preventing Malaria and especially after the Tsunami in Indo. David and I, along with Robb Havassy, attended the SA Fundraiser in Malibu last night. I got to meet Donovan Frankenreiter and his beautiful family and hear him perform for the first time in more than 5 years. They sounded just brilliant! What an amazing day to be followed by another amazing day: today. Read about this here on David’s Blog.

Donovan Frankenreiter and his band performing at Surfaid International's Behind the Palms Fundraiser in Malibu

Robb is in town to do a phenomenal show together with David tonight at a truly amazing location, The Stoneworks Gallery. David wrote about it here. There will be a Luau in the garden tonight, complete with roasted pig, mai tais, tikis and hula. And I will have a Betty Belts table set up to offer my ocean-inspired adornments (including sea glass jewelry and my upcycled Surfboard Resin jewelry and plumeria flower hair clips to add tropical style. You should come! Details below.

But first, I will be at the Stewart+Brown Sample Sale, selling my samples and seconds at my table there. We are truly blessed to have these places and people in Ventura, an international organic fashion designer who makes absolute gorgeousness. I wore a Stewart+Brown dress to the event last night and got stopped twice about it. : ) Want to come? 955 East Front Street, Ventura, 93001 from 12-5.

And tonight, the Luau! At 300 Ventura Avenue, corner Park Row (entrance gate on Park Row). 5-9 Includes Feast and Entertainment in the garden $45 at the door (bring cash). After 9pm free entrance to see the art and gather around the fire. Questions? 805-643-5431

Don’t miss this blog David wrote this morning on this very subject!

Onward!

Everybody Matters

donna — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 18:23:16 +0000

Seth on Scale

donna — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 17:53:20 +0000

“It’s good because rightsizing allows you to be profitable and live as a human.”

Today’s Daily Dose of Seth once again just nails it. This is one of many reasons I don’t send my designs free to celebrities and don’t want to sell my brand to Macy’s or Urban Outfitters. I keep BB small and manageable so I don’t lose control and can keep surfing, but most of all, so it can remain win-win for my artisans, my staff, my self and my customers. In manageable scale.

Once, in 2007, my brand was on display at the National Retail Federation’s annual “Big Show” at Javitz Center in NYC, in the “Store of the Future” installation of a Pop-up Store.

I felt like such a prostitute when I saw who was coming. The C-Class of all the big box retailers marched through and I had to stand there and explain to them why they needed to make environmental and social responsibility a priority. A major shoes and accessories chain asked me to create a cheap line of jewelry for them which I felt would have necessitated exploitation of the people making them to get the price as low as they needed it so I simply said NO.

Thank you, Seth, once again, for confirming what I already knew in my heart.

Ready for the doors to open.

Giving Thanks

donna — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 19:49:46 +0000

Winter Morning Love in California by David Pu'u

Gratitude is something I feel more than ever now. Just an example:

Last night my production manager (who is like family) in Bali and I had a “meeting” across oceans. We chatted and shared pictures via online messenger and email with our respective smartphones. It allowed us to be so close, as if we were sitting together in her family compound where she houses the Betty Belts Bali headquarters.

We discussed numbers, financials and timelines, but we also laughed a lot and even shared cat pictures… and I am grateful for the connections like this, for the connectedness… I haven’t been back to Bali in over a year, but I am grateful that my business can still work due to new technology wedded to a faith in my people there…

Connectedness is easier than ever now… with family, friends, business…

I couldn’t have said it any better than Seth Godin did today here:

“… celebrate two things:

The people in our lives who give us the support and love we need to make a difference, and…

The opportunity to build something bigger than ourselves, something worth contributing. The ability to make connections, to lend a hand, to invent and create.

There are more of both now than there have ever been before…” (read rest of Seth’s blog here)

And this slideshow I created a while back says it all too.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. Thank you for being here and being authentic and being you.

May you find connectedness in all aspects of your life and enjoy the bounty it offers you.

Cause Collection – Four Surfers | Four Designs | Four Causes

donna — Sun, 02 May 2010 21:58:31 +0000

I have a beautiful new collection coming out shortly (check www.BettyBelts.com starting May 10th). I’ve been busy tying up all the loose ends to get it on the site and available to you. Meanwhile, my S.O. David Pu’u, who shot all the designs and the women behind them, Team Betty, wrote a beautiful piece on his blog, which is also a source for a sneak peek at the new Betty B. designs for 2010.

As a local yoga teacher always says: Come see!

Excerpt from David’s Blog:

My girlfriend, Donna Von Hoesslin, who heads up yet another globally connected small business that is based here (Betty B) told me that she was in desperate need of images for a new line of jewelry which is designed by members of Team Betty.

So we dropped in on the party at J’s, sat in the window booth and shot the girl’s designs there as Bobby and crew rocked. Typically we would do this away in some distant land, or somewhere on the coast. Definitely not associated with any particular business. (I actually have developed a penchant for Ventura night, street shoots) But deciding to both take care of Betty B’s business needs, and provide bodies, texture and a few extra dollars to the day’s till at J’s, allowed for an exponential increase of benefit for everyone involved.

Here is a video that explains in 4 minutes, the gist of Donna’s remarkable company. We did the piece for the Intuit Small Business United program. It helped Donna win a 5000 dollar grant from Intuit, which she used to help fund her Bali expedition.

On Bali last season, Hailey and Sierra Partridge, Jeanette Ortiz, Mary Osborne, and Donna, did a Betty B design trip. Each one of the girls worked with the local artisans who comprise a portion of Donna’s creative team, to produce collection pieces that exemplified themselves as ocean connected women. Each young woman then selected a cause or charity, whereby Betty B would donate a portion of the income from sales of each piece.

Donna’s company is a very active member of yet another organization, which was the brainchild of Ventura’s Chouinard family (Patagonia), which is called One Percent for the Planet. Through One Percent, Donna and other companies support David Booth’s fantastic Organization, the East Bali Poverty Project, which literally is changing the face of Bali, by educating the youth on their connection to the environment via the Arts and cultural action.

So with our country on the ropes, it all starts here. With me. With you. In our own back yard.

The answer is right there in your community: your dollars are a part of your voice. Now do something. Do it for yourself. Do it for your town. But more importantly: do it. By acting locally you affect Globally, as well as Nationally. Do it.

Visit David’s Blog to read more and, of course, see all the PICTURES!

What We Do.

donna — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 00:47:02 +0000

David Pu’u is, as you probably already know, a very gifted photographer of beautiful things. He and I are both blessed to work with some amazing people, including twins Hailey and Sierra Partridge. Here is his most recent blog about what that means…

Model Models

by David Pu’u

Recently, NYC based production company Silent Crow was in Ventura. Two writers with the company happened to have connected with Donna Von Hoesslin of Betty B and learning a little bit about her female inspired Eco Fashion line. They came up with an idea.

Producer Matt Bennett showed up to do a little bit of discovery work, and honed a reality show concept that deviated from the norm, in that it endeavors to look at the personalities and lives of the women in both my and Donna’s lives. Silent Crow named the show Bonafide.

Donna and I have long exchanged working relationships with people who we see as unique, and able to be involved in both the editorial market, and branding process, both for the model as a product, and for Betty B’s unique, ethics based, fashion accessories line.

What Matt discovered is that each one of these women is a story unto themselves. Tricky thing to formulate a show upon. I just saw the teaser reel that Silent Crow Produced, and that I contributed footage and stills to. I think they get it. Not an easy thing to do, getting something that is a world unto itself… (continue reading and see more gorgeous shots)

Betty Belts in the Media: Donna’s a Cover Girl!

donna — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 18:06:55 +0000

Wow, I’m blown away!

I’m a “Cover Girl” today!

Check out this inspiring article below from this week’s VC Reporter…

Betty Belts Owner/Designer Donna von Hoesslin graces the cover of the VC Reporter with one of her all time favorite quotes by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Commerce, Compassion and Community

by Claudia Pardo McFayden

The sweet scent of African freesia wafting through the store and onto the street entices visitors into the carefully decorated eclectic space that is Betty Belts. Cradled in a corner just off the beaten path in Downtown Ventura, the cozy yet vibrant ocean-inspired accessories shop, owned and run by Donna Von Hoesslin, is replete with beautiful and unique jewelry and accessories — ceramic necklaces, metal pendants, leather cuffs, colorful scarves, elaborate belts, cute beanies, intricate hairpins and more. It’s a delightful bazaar of one-of-a-kind, handmade treasures.

Established as an online store back in 2003, Betty Belts, also known as Betty B., is older than its current brick and mortar location. It began as a wholesale and online brand of belts in Santa Cruz, with a later addition of jewelry. “The brand existed before I opened the store,” says Von Hoesslin. Operating out of a warehouse on the basis of win-win — people, environment efficiency and women’s surfing, Betty B.’s promise has been to show up in the community while offering a unique and accessible product.

A surfer herself for more than 10 years, Von Hoesslin finds her inspiration in the beach and in her time spent out in the ocean. It was her passion for surfing that caused her trepidation about opening a retail store. “I didn’t originally want a physical location,” she admits. “I was afraid I would not have time to surf, have a life.” Her boyfriend and biggest supporter, David Pu’u, Santa Barbara native and celebrated photographer and filmmaker, encouraged her to get the space. Von Hoesslin took her board out to sea and found her answer in the place that inspired it all to begin with. She opened Betty Belts in 2007. “It was the best decision I ever made.”

Since then, Betty B. has become a hub of connectedness in the community. Offering an array of uniquely designed jewelry by local artists and artisans from Bali, it remains true to its original promise: to contribute to the community and build relationship through a unique product. Work by local artists including that of the skillful Hands of Stone, a group of women who make eco-friendly ceramic necklaces with ocean-influenced elements, Kathleen Fitzgerald’s one-of-a-kind, exquisitely crafted, hand-made earrings; Guy Q. Goods’ metal jewelry for men and women; Lise Solvang’s cozy alpaca and bamboo knits; Tiki Tony ceramic tiki necklaces; and David Pu’u’s attention-demanding prints that serve as the main wall décor in the shop.

Women are especially responsive to Von Hoesslin’s enriching collaboration with the artists, not only the female patrons but all the women who become interconnected through Betty Belts. There is a tangible female bond that begins with Von Hoesslin as the connector and is often sparked by chance meetings at Betty Belts. “I introduce women who come to the shop to each other, and cool things happen,” she says. One particular connection is mothers and daughters.

“They wear the same jewelry. I dig it,” she says. Often she will find the mothers coming back to the store to purchase a new piece because their daughters are wearing theirs. The common faux-pas of being caught wearing the same accessory is instead a thrilling commonality among her female customers.

A recent collaboration between Von Hoesslin and what is affectionately knows as Team Betty, a group of female surfers who have become essential in the promotion and marketing of Betty Belts, resulted in the personal design of a piece of jewelry by each of four local sufers: Mary Osborne, Jeannette Ortiz, Hailey Partridge and Sierra Partridge.

Together with Von Hoesslin and Pu’u, they traveled to Bali, where they worked and executed this creative project.

In addition to working with local artists, Von Hoesslin employs several artisans from Bali, where most of the pieces are made. Having worked for close to seven years with the same artisans, Donna has established a work ethic based on fairness, skill, good quality and, most important for her, community…

Continue reading here:

http://www.vcreporter.com/cms/story/detail/commerce_compassion_and_community/7661/

P.S.

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Bali!

donna — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 23:23:25 +0000

An amazing trip is being planned. A journey with a gaggle of the bright lights which make up a good part of the Betty Belts Surf team: Mary Osborne, Jeanette Ortiz and Twins Sierra and Hailey Partridge.
David Pu’u will be directing and shooting this ambitious project about designing and contributing, grace and cultural respect, spirituality and sustainability, and of course some surfing. He is often better able to express what exactly I do in Bali when I go there to work with the Artisans who hand make all Betty Belts products. So I’m very excited about this!

To follow this journey, follow me on twitter

http://www.twitter.com/bettybelts