HOW TO START A COOL-GIRL BRAND WITH CHARLIE HOURSTON OF CHARLIE BEADS
Photo by Stefanie Lee Johnson styled by Ruth Gonzalez, courtesy of Charlie Beads
Charlotte ‘Charlie’ Hourston started Charlie Beads in her Vancouver bedroom during lockdown, now it’s a verified cool-girl brand with something of a cult following. The model slash entrepreneur now runs the jewelry line slash fashion brand with her assistant, Margot when she’s not on set.
Just four years in, Charlie Beads has already collaborated with brands like Madewell and is stocked in retail shops in both Canada and the US. I wanted to know how the girl did it, so I sat down with Charlie over Zoom to chat branding, business and most importantly, beads.
Mariah Krey and Winona Weber photographed by Chloe Horseman, courtesy of Charlie Beads
Born and raised in Vancouver, BC, Charlie always had an interest in fashion. During her latter years of high school, Charlie and her mother relocated to California. She tells me that it was there that her mother started a clothing line, which initially piqued her interest.
“My mom had started a brand and that [was] integral to my evolution of self…I was like, I need in on that,” Charlie tells me from her LA living room. She explains that she began modelling for her mother’s line, Lotte.99 while applying to various U.S. colleges.
“I didn't know what I wanted but it's what everyone else was doing,” she admits, “In schools in America, that is what they tell you every day.”
After facing rejection from her first-choice college, Charlie was not discouraged. Instead, she sought out real-world work experience and joined forces with her mother to help grow Lotte.99, managing functions of the business as a teen.
“I worked for her for a year, learned so much and realized I did not have what it took at that time,” she reflects. “I did not have the commitment level needed and I was just not cut out for it at the time.”
When things went South, Charlie went North. She headed back to Canada to pursue retail and found a job with Canadian mega-brand, Aritzia. Her sales associate position eventually led to an in-house job at the company’s HQ, where she began work as a styling assistant in their photo studio. It was at this time that Charlie began making herself beaded necklaces inspired by the pricier versions that she couldn’t then afford.
“I wanted this one from another brand and it was $400. I was like, I can make that myself, which is something my mom always taught me,” she explains. “When it came to something as simple as this, I was like, I got this.”
When Charlie began sporting her homemade designs to work, people took notice. Friends and coworkers began requesting them, and soon Charlie’s necklaces were showing up on the youthful necks of New York and the West Coast’s most stylish industry players.
With encouragement from her friends and coworkers, Charlie eventually decided to leap back to Los Angeles to pursue professional modelling. This was March 2020.
Photo courtesy of Charlie Beads
When the modelling contract Charlie had just signed slipped through her fingers, she decided to take her jewelry designs to Instagram.
“I was at home in lockdown…I had literally nothing to do so I was like, I'm just gonna make a few of these and throw them up on my story and see if anyone wants one,” she says, recounting how low her pricepoint was at the time, “I don't think it even covered the cost of the beads.”
She began using the public profile she was building online to promote her beaded designs.
“In this city, if you are on Instagram, you have the ability to sell things…Most people are working with brands,” she notes.
As demand for Charlie’s signature beachcore-meets-nostalgia beaded necklaces and bracelets grew, she saw an opportunity to turn the side hustle into a viable business. She created a new handle, and thus, Charlie Beads was born.
“I don't even really remember coming up with the name,” she admits. “People in the beginning made fun of it. They were like, Oh, Charlotte's into beading now.”
Skepticism from others didn’t hold her back. Charlie knew she was onto something good and let that propel her forward.“I had this crazy adrenaline…I was able to stay up till six in the morning beading in the beginning,” she shares.
Accepting that she was now formally running a business, Charlie had to work through the unexpected challenges and growing pains that came with the job. She began moving away from the bespoke, maker-to-person business model that initially led to her finding success via Instagram.
A natural step in the progression of brand development, Charlie shares that setting boundaries was one of the most difficult parts of shifting the brand to an e-commerce platform. “That's a big thing in my life anyway”, she says.
With a functioning website now in place, and a blossoming modelling career underway, Charlie continued to look for new ways to inspire her audience, while staying true to her vision. “I was trying to figure out what they wanted and what I wanted to give them. I don't want to make something that doesn't fulfill me—that's the whole point of this, to have a creative outlet outside of my personal image,” she says.
Photo courtesy of Charlie Beads
At the end of 2022, Charlie switched gears and began working on an extensive rebrand. She began toying with the idea of making clothing. “I wanted to make one capsule piece based off a shirt that I put on whenever I'm feeling kind of icky,” she describes, noting, “which is quite often because it's really hot here….I did my one cut-and-sew piece and that got a lot of interest at the launch party…I was like, Oh, people are excited.”
The shirt experiment led Charlie to begin using her wardrobe as inspiration and that’s when shit got real. Charlie began directing her own branded photoshoots, tapping her LA/Vancouver creative connections to create beautiful visual content that evoked her brand’s world.
The Charlie Beads world is filled with dewey-skinned Californians and fairy-like women nestled into soft landscapes. They lounge across sun-drenched Angeleno pavement in delicate, handmade pieces like her signature bloomers–relaxed and carefree. They’re on your Pinterest boards. They’re living their best lives. They’re the epitome of cool-girl aspiration.
Winona Weber and Mariah Krey photographed by Chloe Horseman, courtesy of Charlie Beads
“I never expected my bloomers to blow up in the way that they did,” she says. “Seeing women step out of their comfort zone and wear them out–pregnant women lounging around in them, is the exact way I was hoping to connect with women.”
Since the brand’s inception just 4 years ago, Charlie Beads has grown with Charlie’s career as a working model. As she continues to grow the brand alongside her professional profile, Charlie and her beads have been naturally cropping up on the radars of industry folks and influencers from around the world.
Photo courtesy of Charlie Beads
“When I go on set, I'm usually telling people about [the brand] and then they get excited about it. Then I'm excited because I'm meeting a photographer or an art director or a producer who is either gonna support the brand or work with us on something or tell someone else about it and end up being a friend…I think that's what lights me up the most” she says.
From the look of Charlie’s effortlessly cool public-facing image, it may seem like success is a breeze for the young entrepreneur. But like any business owner, finding motivation to press on in difficult times can be daunting. “I often wake up in the morning and go, I don't think I can keep doing this or why am I doing this or what am I going to do next?” she shares. “My advice would be: when you feel that way, don't give up.”
Photo courtesy of Charlie Beads
So what’s next for Charlie Beads? The young entrepreneur tells me she plans to create more “female gaze-y” designs, “clothing for women meant to feel comfortable and stylish…I'm just gonna keep digging through my closet.”
Learn more about Charlie and Charlie Beads on the brand’s website and be sure to follow her on Instagram.
