A little of the back ground - Ms. Chaffee comes from a musical family (she plays flute), and she raised a musical family. Her Mother always donates to musicians on the street because she worries about her far away musical son not making enough money himself.

Ms. Chaffee always loved to give home made gifts, although in the many years raising children, she did not have the time. – Except, of course, to give teachers home made cookies for years and years. All of a sudden when her kids got their drivers licenses, she had a little extra time on my hands.In a period of two years, she made home made purses of various kinds for numerous friends and relatives. She learned every which way one could construct a purse. Then one day, walking thru the craft store, she saw a button that looked like a violin chin rest. She thought instantly of making a violin purse, and Voila (not viola or that too) - everyone loved it. She called up a very classy violinist, and asked her if she liked my purse, as Ms. Chaffee was considering making them to sell on Etsy. (Then when she actually took the time to come over, it felt silly because you don’t need a PhD violinist from Juilliard to judge a purse – but this woman is so classy and I wanted classy people to want my purse). She loved it so much, she said “I need this” and asked to buy one. Ms. Chaffee gave her one to test out. Upon the recommendations of the violinist, some practical changes were made to the purse so she could use it as a gig bag to hold her violin strings, tuner and other musical paraphernalia. She brought it to symphony and hung it in her studio. She did not try to sell it, but absolutely every one that saw it loved it and asked where she got it. It took many many months to develop Violettes so that they are both more functional and more practical to produce than the very first one. Ms. Chaffee has a Masters degree in Engineering from Cornell University, so she is trained to solve problems. She is an outside the box thinker, and too outside the box for some, but it works for this field.

The violinist kept asking for the purse to be bigger and bigger. It got big enough that a professional cellist wanted to buy one. (All the cellists that wanted the purse preferred the violin rather than cello purses because of the extra bling, such as the beautiful chin rests made out of many different kinds of buttons and pins). This cellist loaded the purse so full that it kept falling off of the music stand. So the biggest violin (cello) purses were designed to hang from a symphony style chair and have a clip to loop around the leg of the chair, such that it won’t swing when reaching into it with one hand.

Ms. Chaffee continued developing new purse styles. Her mother asked her to make little ones for “Suzuki children”. Ms. Chaffee's daughter went to a violin clinic when she was little, and the somewhat famous instructor asked her to “love your violin” as is needed to turn the notes into “music”. If little girls have cute little violin purses that hold rosin and their pencil, it might help them love their violins. Ms. Chaffee has made a number of the minis. The minis are also great for adults as small night purses. And, they are nice as little fanny packs.

After being a stay at home Mom and volunteering at schools for so many years – Ms. Chaffe had so much fun creating and learning about the fabric industry. She thanks my amazing husband for his support. She also thanks Chuck Christiansen from the Knoxville SCORE for his support. And to have a business excuse to travel to concerts is a great kind of a job! She loves her Violette – She carries it everywhere.