As you walk in­to her bou­tique in Long Cir­cu­lar Mall, you in­stan­ta­neous­ly feel an eclec­tic vibe. Every inch of the space oozes so­phis­ti­ca­tion, from her large ini­tials, CP, on the walls, to the im­ages of fa­mous women whose styles she likes – you can eas­i­ly tell that every­thing you see in the store is part of what feeds her cre­ativ­i­ty. Her style is al­ways el­e­gant and nev­er run of the mill. Renowned for her sig­na­ture work in var­i­ous types of fab­rics – silks, in­tri­cate hand em­broi­deries and lux­u­ri­ous fab­ri­ca­tions, she is de­fin­i­tive­ly dy­nam­ic though diminu­tive, sassy and classy. She is not on­ly fash­ion; she is Trinida­di­an fash­ion de­sign­er Clau­dia Pe­gus.

Bear­er of a lega­cy of ex­cel­lence, which mo­ti­vates, trig­gers and dri­ves her in­ner­most be­ing. She is Style! Clau­dia Pe­gus is an icon­ic busi­ness­woman who stands apart as a re­silient and pas­sion­ate en­tre­pre­neur with fierce am­bi­tion, no non­sense busi­ness smart and a down-to-earth charis­ma. This Trinida­di­an cou­turiere has ven­tured to, held her own and built a strong and rep­utable name in the high­ly com­pet­i­tive glob­al fash­ion in­dus­try. With a de­sign com­pa­ny that bears her name and fo­cus­es on an ex­clu­sive niche mar­ket, she caters to a cos­mopoli­tan of lo­cal, re­gion­al and in­ter­na­tion­al dig­ni­taries, pub­lic fig­ures, mod­els and celebri­ties.

It all be­gan for Clau­dia in the late 1970’s while em­ployed in the field of Ed­u­ca­tion at the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies. Clau­dia be­gan im­port­ing cloth­ing from Lon­don for re­tail sale in Trinidad. With the re­al­i­sa­tion that the Eu­ro­pean cut was not the prop­er fit for the Caribbean woman body, it awak­ened the en­tre­pre­neur­ial skills with­in her and she be­gan strip­ping and recre­at­ing gar­ments. This was by no means a sim­ple task, but earned her the skill of an ‘A’ class cut­ter. At this point, Clau­dia’s com­pa­ny went from sell­ing im­port­ed cloth­ing to cre­at­ing its own de­signs.

Busi­ness grew and ex­pan­sion brought its own share of suc­cess­es and chal­lenges. This fu­elled Clau­dia’s learn­ing and growth as she used all her ex­pe­ri­ences as tools of learn­ing and rein­ven­tion. By 1983 the econ­o­my’s down­turn and Clau­dia’s need to pur­sue in­ter­na­tion­al op­por­tu­ni­ties and school­ing trig­gered her move to Spain, where she em­braced the op­por­tu­ni­ty to add to her skill set by work­ing with tai­lors in Barcelona. By the late 80’s she owned and op­er­at­ed a small ate­lier in Ger­many while still main­tain­ing el­e­ments of her busi­ness in Trinidad. So en­am­oured by her time in Spain, Clau­dia de­cid­ed to re­lo­cate, but fate had oth­er plans for the bud­ding en­tre­pre­neur. On her re­turn to Trinidad, she would be em­braced by high-end clien­tele - And so be­gan the evo­lu­tion of the Clau­dia Pe­gus brand.

Clau­dia’s se­r­i­al in­ter­est in busi­ness and her quest for ex­cel­lence en­er­gis­es her mo­men­tum and fu­els un­par­al­leled suc­cess. The quin­tes­sen­tial Caribbean de­sign­er and a pro­duc­er of un­com­pro­mised in­dige­nous de­sign and flair, it is no sur­prise that Clau­dia has been ac­tive with­in the Caribbean re­gard­ing busi­ness de­vel­op­ment. Hav­ing worn sev­er­al oth­er hats such as Im­age and Wardrobe Pro­to­col Con­sul­tant for ex­ec­u­tives and board mem­bers of var­i­ous or­gan­i­sa­tions, she has worked with var­i­ous bod­ies re­gard­ing re­struc­tur­ing re­tail and ex­port ori­ent­ed com­pa­nies in the fash­ion in­dus­try.

She has al­so pre­sent­ed pa­pers on var­i­ous busi­ness and Caribbean de­vel­op­ment ini­tia­tives lo­cal­ly and re­gion­al­ly. Par­tic­u­lar­ly val­ued by her is the top­ic of en­cour­age­ment and fos­ter­ing of women in busi­ness. She is of the strong be­lief that women need a sis­ter­hood with a men­tal­i­ty sim­i­lar to the sup­port groups en­joyed by men.

Among Clau­dia’s string of ac­co­lades and awards in recog­ni­tion of her achieve­ments in fash­ion, wor­thy of men­tion­ing is her be­ing the re­cip­i­ent of the UN­ESCO Seal of Ex­cel­lence Award for her work done with Sea Is­land Cot­ton and the Cha­co­nia Medal in 2010 from the Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go for her out­stand­ing con­tri­bu­tion in the field of fash­ion.

Her on­go­ing un­par­al­leled and re­mark­able con­tri­bu­tions made in the Caribbean Fash­ion In­dus­try to in­flu­ence its growth and in­ter­na­tion­al recog­ni­tion is an in­spi­ra­tion to women who need look no fur­ther for a de­f­i­n­i­tion of suc­cess and sheer strength. Her biggest chal­lenge is that of un­der­stand­ing her own jour­ney and she sees each day as a re­fresh­ing learn­ing ex­pe­ri­ence with per­son­al mo­ti­va­tion de­rived from con­quer­ing each lit­tle step.

To­day, with over 40 years of ex­pe­ri­ence in the busi­ness, Clau­dia Pe­gus De­signs Lim­it­ed is an ex­clu­sive niche mar­ket de­sign/ pro­duc­tion It pro­duces two la­bels: The Clau­dia Pe­gus la­bel car­ri­er fea­tur­ing the haute cou­ture lines, and the CPFS la­bel which pro­duces the ready wear and ca­reer ap­par­el lines for re­tail and whole­sale pur­chas­es by bou­tiques, ho­tels, re­sorts and cor­po­ra­tions.

I re­cent­ly had a love­ly chat with Clau­dia to ask her some ques­tions and this is what she had to share with me.

Bri­an: Who is Clau­dia Pe­gus?

Clau­dia: A daugh­ter, a sis­ter, a friend.

Bri­an: How would you de­scribe your sense of Style?

Clau­dia: Clas­sic El­e­gance.

Bri­an: How would you de­scribe the typ­i­cal Clau­dia Pe­gus woman?

Clau­dia: Con­fi­dent and dri­ven. Very much a team play­er and fo­cused on build­ing a bet­ter world for all.

Bri­an: If you were to dress one pow­er­ful woman in the world, who would it be and why?

Clau­dia: Michelle Oba­ma be­cause she per­son­i­fies qual­i­ties that I ad­mire; con­fi­dence, style, poise.

Bri­an: Which pow­er­ful fe­male fig­ures you look up to and what about them you ad­mire?

Clau­dia: Nan­cy Pelosi, Brid­gette An­nisette George, Di­anne Hunt, Oprah Win­frey, Sheena Thor­pe , Liz Mon­tano, Sharon Row­ley, Mia Mot­t­ley, Michelle Oba­ma. Each and every one of these women are a sol­id en­ti­ty on their own. I call them foun­da­tion women on whose shoul­ders tow­ers are built. ...need I say more?

Bri­an: Do you think fash­ion is a form or an out­let for em­pow­er­ing women?

Clau­dia: To me fash­ion is about style. Per­son­al or in­flu­enced. It shows...style can­not be pur­chased. Fash­ion can.

Bri­an: How do you em­pow­er women with your de­signs?

Clau­dia: I do not strive to in­flu­ence my clients' sense of fash­ion. I al­low my clients' sense of style to in­flu­ence my di­rec­tion as my job is to en­hance and em­pow­er what they project in­di­vid­u­al­ly.

Bri­an: What chal­lenges you had to over­come as a woman in busi­ness to reach where you are to­day?

Clau­dia: Over­com­ing chal­lenges will al­ways be a work in progress. Un­der­stand­ing the bal­ance of fem­i­nine pow­er, which is a mix­ture of soft and ten­der­ness with strength and firm­ness. Lis­ten­ing to all sides but mak­ing the fi­nal de­ci­sion. Sift­ing fluff from sub­stance. Pri­or­i­tiz­ing quite think­ing time with­in the noise. Cap­tur­ing and main­tain­ing the pow­er with­in good and bad times.

Bri­an: What more can be done in Trinidad and To­ba­go to em­pow­er women?

Clau­dia: Our voic­es are heard in the cor­ri­dors of in­flu­ence and we should con­tin­ue to build on that. We have a cur­rent Speak­er of the House who is fe­male; we have had a fe­male At­tor­ney Gen­er­al, Sen­ate Pres­i­dent, Prime Min­is­ter and a cur­rent Pres­i­dent. To me equal recog­ni­tion for com­pe­tence is the main in­gre­di­ent.

Bri­an: As a suc­cess­ful busi­ness­woman what ad­vice can you give oth­er women who are in­ter­est­ed in get­ting in­to busi­ness as well?

Clau­dia: Stay fo­cused on your dreams and build from your strengths. Noth­ing is im­pos­si­ble if you fo­cus on self-de­vel­op­ment. Lis­ten and learn.

Bri­an: What must-have piece of cloth­ing a woman should have in their clos­et?

Clau­dia: Def­i­nite­ly a black sheath dress.

About Bri­an

Bri­an has a pas­sion for every­thing fash­ion and pub­lic re­la­tions. With a re­sume span­ning over 10 years of ex­pe­ri­ence, he has worked with a num­ber of brands, tal­ent and per­son­al­i­ties. Bri­an is pro­fes­sion­al­ly qual­i­fied in Pub­lic Re­la­tions, Events Man­age­ment, and his name in the lo­cal fash­ion fra­ter­ni­ty, is syn­ony­mous with styling, cre­ative di­rec­tion and mod­el man­age­ment. He en­joys writ­ing and shar­ing his thought on fash­ion, en­ter­tain­ment, lifestyle and beau­ty.