Entrepreneurship professor to moderate Sept. 26 chat with former KU student, fashion entrepreneur Elyce Arons
LAWRENCE — Elyce Arons, co-founder of the Kate Spade and Frances Valentine brands, will make her first return to the University of Kansas campus in Lawrence in more than four decades — a visit that will be punctuated by a fireside chat for students and the broader KU community.
Arons’ entrepreneurial endeavors are laid out in her New York Times best-selling book, "We Might Just Make It After All: My Best Friendship with Kate Spade," published in June.
The fireside chat will be moderated by entrepreneurship expert Elizabeth Embry, assistant professor in the KU School of Business. The event begins at 2 p.m. Sept. 26 at the Burge Union and will be followed by a book signing. There is an online RSVP for those interested in attending.
Arons’ weekend in Lawrence will include touring campus, attending the KU vs. Cincinnati football game at David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium and celebrating the 100th anniversary of the West Campus Road house of Chi Omega (Lambda chapter), of which Arons is a member.
“Elyce Arons is a visionary entrepreneur with an incredible story to tell,” said Chancellor Douglas A. Girod. “We are delighted to welcome her back to the University of Kansas, and we are thrilled that our students and the broader community will get the chance to engage with her. KU aspires to educate leaders who go on to change the world — and Elyce is exactly the kind of leader our students can learn from and emulate.”
Elyce Cox and Katy Brosnahan met as KU freshmen at GSP Hall in 1981. Following a move to Arizona State University and then to New York, the pair of former Jayhawks launched the Kate Spade brand in 1993.
A decade after selling Kate Spade to Neiman Marcus, the pair returned with the 2016 launch of Frances Valentine, where Arons serves as CEO.
Before becoming a Jayhawk, Arons grew up on a working farm in Sedgwick, about 25 miles north of Wichita. "We Just Might Make It After All" follows Arons from her early years in central Kansas and college life in 1980s Lawrence to her and Spade’s ascent into fashion, becoming a household name in handbags and more.
As a KU freshman, Arons set out to pursue a degree in journalism like her beloved Mary Richards of “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.” Now, Arons herself is the subject of media coverage, having appeared recently on “Good Morning America” and in Fortune, Forbes, The New York Times, Bazaar, Elle, Rolling Stone and others.
In her book, Arons recalls some of her earliest memories being afternoons after school flipping through her mother’s copy of Women’s Wear Daily before doing her assigned chores. Now, Arons finds herself in WWD’s pages, most recently in a feature story this summer when her book was published.