Meet Tiffany Leigh Hornbeck

Today we’d like to introduce you to Tiffany Leigh Hornbeck.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Tiffany Leigh. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
I was born and raised in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Growing up a blue-collar country town in the Rocky Mountain definitely gave me a different outlook on life. Constantly being surrounded by nature and more animals than people made me really appreciate the beauty of nature and the world. I would just sit outside and draw. I was always drawing, night and day, even from a young again. I don’t know how true it is but my mother would tell you that from the time I could pick up a pencil or more likely crayon at that time, I would be drawing people’s faces and clothing at all times of day. Not having a lot around but nature really made me more creative with my time.

I wouldn’t say I always knew I wanted to be a fashion designer. My first love was definitely art but then as I got older for a long time my second became volleyball and in my young mind truly though a future in volleyball was where I was going and as I got older and realized that I probably wasn’t going to play on the Olympic beach volleyball team. I finally thought why don’t I blend my two loves and became obsessed with fashion. I loved everything about. Unfortunately, living in Wyoming I didn’t think I was going to go very far in the fashion industry unless it was in the more business and retail side of it. So, I began taking every marketing and retail class I could. I joined a school organization called DECA that was ran by one of my favorite teachers back then, Mrs. Meredith. She really pushed me to compete in the fashion merchandising category of the club. My competition was in fashion merchandising promotion planning and I knew after that conference I wanted to do more in the fashion industry than just the business side of stuff but it didn’t know how I would get there.

Then, one day my father came home with option to move to Dallas, TX and I knew this was my chance. I told him I want to move and a few months later the house was packed and we were on our way here, it wasn’t that easy when I got here though. I was starting from the beginning. It was my senior year of high school and I was just now taking real art and fashion classes when others had been taking them for years. It was hard to make up that lost time but I knew if I stayed focused, I would have a good opportunity to get into a good fashion school still. After graduating. I looked at fashion school all over the United States and around the world. Eventually, I decided on UNT, it was ranked top 10 in the United States at the time and it would give me the opportunity to work on both business and design side of the industry.

Getting into UNT was just the start. I knew if I wanted to get to where I wanted to be then I had a lot to learn and a lot of work to do. I started interning with everyone I could early on. The internship that I felt taught me the most so far is when I interned for Jan Strimple. She is a fashion producer in the DFW area. Interning with Jan showed me so many different sides of the business from start to finish. As, I have grown in the fashion design program at UNT and through my internships I finally about a year ago decided it was time to put everything that I have learned in motion to start my own business and Tiffy Leigh and Company was born.

Has it been a smooth road?
It definitely has not always been so easy. Wanting to work in the fashion industry when you really have no good connections is hard. I had to build everything from scratch. I had to learn how to network on my own. I spent hours, days really looking for internships and opportunities everywhere i could just to get a foot in the door so that someone would teach me something I didn’t already know or just to get my name out there to prove that this is something i really wanted to do and I’m here for the long haul.

One of my biggest struggles though actually had nothing to do with fashion. It was person. About two years ago now, I was in a very bad car accident that left me in a lot of pain and in really bad shape. For almost a year I was in the worst pain that I had ever felt in my life and going through the toughest point in my program at UNT. It was a lot to say the least. It became a struggle every day to want to even move or get out of bed. My mental state was in the worst place it had ever been and I started thinking that this was the end of fashion for me. One of the only things that kept me going to class and focused was my fashion show production class taught by Barbara Trippeer. She taught the class as if it was our job, we were fashion show producers and we were going to do this all together as equals. It was everything I needed. I got to think big in her class and really get to understand more of the fashion industry. By the end of the year we produced the senior 2019 fashion show and instead of leaving school that semester thinking that I may not come back because my health had severely declined by that point. I left school knowing I gave it everything I had and all I wanted to do now is get healthy so that I could come back because this is where I wanted to be and I had to so much more I needed to learn if I wanted to start a business.

We’d love to hear more about your company. 
Tiffy Leigh and Company custom designs beach wear for women. The brand is all about bring out your inner island girl. We make custom swimsuits and other beach wear products for all demographics of women. We are definitely known for our fun beautiful prints and high-waisted bikini bottoms.

The best part about what Tiffy Leigh and Company does is getting to see how happy our customs are with the final product. It’s so often that you can never find the swimsuit for the pool, lake or beach vacation that you really want and even sometimes when you do it’s normal online, out of stock and doesn’t fit the way you thought it would to start with. Being able to custom make the swimsuit from start to finish not only makes it fit the body perfectly but it also makes it more personal to who that person is. The goal is always to make our customers feel beautiful and confident in their own skin and who they are.

Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
I love Dallas! It has great bones. Because of the growing infrastructure it gives all small businesses the opportunity to grow and build a lot easier than in some other cities and places. It also really helps that because Dallas is kind on centrally located it makes it easier to work with both coasts. The only downer to living and working here is because Dallas is always growing. You always have to find a new to stay relevant to your customs because there is always something newer out there.

Pricing:

• basic bando bikinis range between: $25-35
• Vintage Harley Davidson crop: $85
• All Custom Denim work starts:$60

Contact Info:

• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/tiffyleighandcompany?igshid=m2fxzfunh9k2

Image Credit:
Personal image photo credit: Tucker Ray
Instagram: @tuckerrayphotography

Model in blush pink bando bikini: Anania Young
Instagram: @x_theoutsider

Model in Shoulder tie retro orange Bikini: Alex Shoberg
Instagram: @ashobs

Model in vintage Harlery Davidson crop top and arrow bikini: Angela Hart
Instagram: @ang_hart

Model in purple and orange retro bikini: Kenli Gunter
Instagram: @kenligunter

Photographer: Tiffany Leigh Hornbeck
Instagram; @Tiffy__Leigh

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