Destira Through the Years: Myriah’s Journey
As children, we all have big dreams of what we will become when we are older. Whether it be to become a teacher, scientist, or even the President of the United States - it is always possible!
Meet Myriah, our Director of Design and Product Development. Growing up, Myriah always dreamed of becoming a designer. After attending design school, Myriah moved to New York and worked for designers such as Lela Rose and Ralph Lauren.
This experience aided Myriah when she moved back across the country to the Bay Area and started her own designer children’s wear company. Myriah also spent 7 years teaching undergraduate and graduate students patternmaking, sewing, and the technical aspects of design.
Myriah has also worked in home design as well. She designed RH’s Baby and Child line and was the Director of Textiles at Pottery Barn. She decided to jump back into the fashion design world by joining Team Destira in 2019. Working in children and teen apparel was a huge bonus for Myriah when starting her role at Destira. “Designing for kids is different than adults, as you have more flexibility. With children, they are trying on who they are.” Over the last 4 years, Myriah has worked hard to create her own path at Destira. The legacy of Destira was one of her main draws to joining the team. “I am excited to create a pathway to scale the growth of the company and have a major impact,” says Myriah.
The past few years have been a challenging time for production across all companies, and Destira’s no different. Myriah was faced with navigating a path through the pandemic, in order to keep product coming and stay profitable through all the supply chain obstacles in manufacturing. “We wanted to honor the long-term relationships we had with our vendors and help them stay afloat.” This was a high value as we’ve been working with some of our vendors for over 20 years! “We were able to pivot to face masks and be the first to market since we manufacture domestically,” says Myriah. While it was a super challenging experience, it was also a HUGE success!
As the Director of Design and Development, Myriah is an integral part of creating new product lines for Destira. Myriah and the team are currently working on quite an exciting project - long-sleeve competition leotards! “This is something we have been working on for a long time. There has been a lot of research, thought, and intention put into this process.”
One of Myriah’s favorite times of the year is when she takes the design team to Los Angeles for the LA Fabric Shows. Not only do they get to source new fabrics for upcoming designs, but they tour the factories where the team’s current designs are being made. It’s a trip filled with team dinners, meeting vendors, and spending time together since our designers work remotely postpandemic.
Destira has a few core values that as a team, we try to live through each day. For Myriah, the core value she relates to most is Family First. “Destira is truly family oriented - it’s not just a slogan.” To Myriah, the people-first mentality at Destira makes it an easy choice to continue working with the company. “Yes we have a job to get done, but we can be flexible in the way we do it so that our employees feel supported.”
Looking back over the last four years with Destira, Myriah says “It’s impressive and exciting to look back at where we were 4 years ago and who we are today. The waters we have waded in to get here; so much growth and change and transition - it's incredible.”
