How a Gift from Kate Spade Helped a Young Woman Succeed

Tassion Minor was gearing up for her upcoming summer internship in New York City when she realized she didn’t have many office-ready outfits in her closet at home in New Orleans.

“I was being exposed to different professional opportunities, many of which required me to dress in business attire, but at the time my wardrobe was lacking in that,” Minor, who was 19 at the time, said. “And money was also tight.”

But Kate Spade helped her change that. Thanks to the fashion designer, she had a small collection of designer clothes — colorful dresses, blazers and a statement-making red purse — by the time she started her internship at the pharmaceutical company Pfizer in New York. Spade, who committed suicide in her Manhattan apartment earlier this week, had donated to the PowHERful foundation, a non-profit founded by journalist-turned-CEO Soledad O’Brien that helps young women graduate from college through mentorship and financial assistance.

Minor and the other PowHERful scholars were treated to a shopping spree during a weekend trip to New York in 2015 to get them ready for their internships the following summer. They arrived at O’Brien’s Manhattan apartment to find it had 30 boxes filled with Kate Spade clothes and accessories. “There were just so many clothes, and they said “OK shop, ladies!” Minor recalled. “I was just so thankful and grateful for that.”

Her new wardrobe, filled with Kate Spade’s signature pops of color, helped Minor’s confidence at work grow “astronomically.”

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