Jordyn Woods-Towns and the Power of a Good Accessory

In a crowded room draped in brown curtains and lush chocolate carpeting, Don Julio espresso martinis flow, and people buzz as shopping assistants bring boots and purses out of the stock room. Music is playing. Ice cubes clink in silver shakers. Selfies are being creatively directed. But amid the chaos, it’s easy to spot the maestro Jordyn Woods-Towns.

From every corner of the space, a flash hits her face, lighting up her joy, excitement, and maybe a little anxiety as she welcomes influencers, stylists, budding celebrities, and journalists to the first-ever in-person pop-up for her fashion line, WOODS by Jordyn. While this is VIP night, where only a few are invited, she still has an entire weekend ahead of her, welcoming the public to experience the fall collection in real life. This isn’t a launch. Woods by Jordyn has been in production since 2023, starting with a capsule of mesh dresses. But this year, the brand rose to prominence after Woods was seen courtside at every New York Knicks championship game, supporting now-husband Karl Anthony-Towns, with a hero piece turned lucky charm: The Woods By Jordyn Tux Mini Clutch in color Summer Citrus.

Over the summer, the national visibility of the orange ostrich skin clutch skyrocketed general interest in Woods-Towns’ fashion brand. The bag — then priced at $125 and now priced at $155 — sold out immediately, prompting her team to move the accessory to pre-order sales only. After the historic Knicks championship win, it spent some time lying in state at New York City’s Guggenheim Museum, was held in the hands of NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani at the championship parade like a bar of gold, and was proudly slung around her neck while taking her official photos holding the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy. Now that the NBA is back in season, however, Woods-Towns has announced in courtside interviews that for her, the orange accessory is in retirement.

“You know it’s a long season. By the time the playoffs come back around, I might have a whole new thing,” she tells VIBE.

While the “new thing” loads as her husband puts in work on the court, Woods-Towns is dribbling an entire new collection of bags, boots, sandals, fur hats and coats for new onlookers. Color schemes that were mostly orange, blue, and white are now burgundy, gray, and chocolate. Textures that were speckled ostrich in the summer are now embossed with crocodile or fur. “It was so awesome getting to see so much of our community in person; people had a really good response to it. They loved seeing the products in person,” Woods-Towns says after the fall collection pop-up weekend. “Everything was so smooth that a lot of people said it was unlike any other pop-up they’ve ever been to…I’m excited, and I’m happy, but I’m exhausted.”

After a whirlwind few days of making TikToks, selling out limited edition clutches within the first hour of sales, taking photos with shoppers as they showed off their large shopping bags of WOODS goodies, and somehow making time to dress up with her husband for Halloween, Woods-Towns catches VIBE up over the phone about the new collection, how she never planned to make the now-iconic bag, rooting for Angel Reese in the WNBA finals, and what’s to come for WOODS in the future.

VIBE: For this new fall collection, you teamed up with Aniya Harvey. Are you a ‘Love Island’ fan?

Jordyn Woods-Towns: I just started watching “Love Island” a few years ago with the season with Leah [Kateb] and Serena [Paige] and JaNa [Craig], and then now I’m like, “I have to watch it every summer.”

So how did you know working with Aniya was the right partnership?

For me, she actually wore my dress on [Love Island]. I said I would love to do something with her, and the “Love Island” fan base does not mess around. So, they were asking me when we were going to do it. I just felt like she was the perfect fit for the collection; she’s such a nice girl in general and was very easy to work with.

A lot of the pieces in this collection have the same structure but different textures or different colors. Does that kind of translate into your own personal style?

I’m somewhere in between simplistic and maximalist. I love something that’s more of a statement piece, but I do love something that you can wear a bunch of different ways, and so I’m always styling the same pieces a bunch of different ways and to different things and to different events. So in a way, I feel like a lot of our pieces are statement pieces, but very wearable.

A lot of people probably learned about your brand after seeing that orange ostrich bag. (The bag was an homage to one of the first luxury gifts Karl gifted her: An orange ostrich purse from Hermès) Are there any other personal connections to some of the other pieces that people might not know about?

Not necessarily. I would just say everything is made with intentionality, from the little mirrors inside the bag to things that resemble certain things or eras in my life, like the bridal collection coming around my wedding. I like to make things I’m inspired by from my day-to-day life because it’s a lot easier with the storytelling aspect.

During the NBA Finals, I’m sure people were like hitting you up like, “How the hell do I get this bag?” How did you know to wait out the demand before putting out new products?

It’s just like we kind of wanted everyone to be able to get the bag, and then they were on pre-order. And for me, pre-order is tricky because there’s a lot of unforeseen things that can happen as a business owner… So for me, I just want to make sure everyone got their products and everything before we really started pushing other things.

Pre-order is really tricky. A lot of people do it now, and a lot of companies do it, and some people are okay with waiting. They actually read, and they’re like, “I just want it.” And some people are like, “If I spent the money, I want it right then and there.” It’s just hard to gauge. I’m sure I could have sold even thousands more bags if I hadn’t put it as sold out; I just wanted to be realistic with the customer.

I remember when you first launched with the mesh dresses in 2023. How has it been to see the brand evolve?

It definitely started with dresses, and now we’re really selling our main product: our accessories and bags. It’s very different, but it’s so much more me. Not to say the dresses aren’t. I kind of fell out of love with making clothes. I pivoted and tried to create solution-based footwear. People with larger calves like mine don’t have access to some of the boots and shoes I would like.

And then we just made bags for fun. We didn’t know people would gravitate towards purchasing the bags.

When you were growing up, which celebrity-backed fashion brands were you into? I feel like there have been so many from the early 2000s.

Not gonna lie, in the early 2000s I was not a fashion girl. I was a tomboy. I was a bigger girl, so I didn’t really feel like there was a lot out there for me and a lot that I resonated with. Same with looking up to someone. There wasn’t really anyone on TV that I was like, “Oh, this feels realistic or attainable to me.”

Of course, there are people that I liked, but no one that I was really inspired by fashion-wise, and I didn’t have the same access as I do now.

As an entrepreneur now, are there any female entrepreneurs that you’re like really inspired by?

I’m inspired by every female entrepreneur because it’s not easy. It’s very difficult, and whether it’s someone in a startup phase or in tech or in health or whatever it is, I’m really inspired by so many different women owners. You know, women — no shade to the men — but we’re really the ones doing the thing right now.

During your wedding weekend, you had some spectacular fashions. Did you have a favorite look from that moment?

Every look was my favorite look. I love all of them.

Oh, Jordyn! Come on!

No, I know I don’t have a favorite. I loved the welcome dinner dress. It was so beautiful, but then it’s like I don’t know if it holds a candle to my wedding dress. But then my afterpa—everything was like so. I just it’s too hard to pick.

I think my wedding dress is definitely number one. Then number two would be the welcome dinner. I think I don’t know. This is.. I’m a Libra. I can’t make a decision.

I thought the civil ceremony suit was super chic.

It was one of Thom Browne’s first-ever bridal looks. But I also love my dresses.

I know you’re a Towns now, but how does it feel for this brand, WOODS by Jordyn, to carry your late father’s last name?

I’m always a Woods. You know that’s my identity. But no, it’s Woods-Towns. I’m gonna hyphenate it. But it’s just, you know, we don’t have a large family. There aren’t many Woods left, and obviously, as a woman, it’s not typical to carry your father’s last name. I only have two brothers, no cousins or anything on my dad’s side. So it was important for me to just do something that definitely honored him and keep our name alive.

I wanted to know: are you a fan of the WNBA? Were you watching the finals?

I definitely was watching the finals. I was really hoping — you know — I’m friends with Angel, so I was rooting for her. But [I’m] really proud of all the women. It’s not an easy job. It’s not easy to, one, make it to a professional league and then, two, make it all the way to the finals. So they should all be super proud of themselves, but I definitely follow them more during playoffs than the regular season. But we love sports in this household, so we always have some type of game on— whether it’s football, baseball, or basketball.

Personally, I’m strictly basketball.

I know you’re still winding down from the excitement of the pop-up, but is there anything that we can look forward to from WOODS in the future?

I’m still coming off all the work and preparation we put into this pop-up to make it happen, but I definitely think that for the rest of the year, we’re going to focus on more initiatives and philanthropic work, especially around the holidays.

And for summer and spring, we’re going to come with some new fire.