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From NIFT to Entrepreneurship: Sara Baijnath’s Rise in the Luxury Industry

Interviewed By Delhi Royale

Edited & Presented By Delhi Royale


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Sara Baijnath’s journey, from studying at NIFT Delhi to leading design at Da Milano and later building Luxury Leather Love, Bag Begum, and SachaBana, shows how her work has grown from creating beautiful products to shaping complete luxury experiences. What started as a love for materials has evolved into an ecosystem built on restoration, storytelling, and meaningful collaborations. Today, her ventures support one another, combining craftsmanship with conscious consumption. Sara’s story is one of growth, resilience, and redefining how India understands and enjoys luxury.
Design Journey of Sara Baijnath

Sara Baijnath


Sara Baijnath’s journey, from studying at NIFT Delhi to leading design at Da Milano and later building Luxury Leather Love, Bag Begum, and SachaBana, shows how her work has grown from creating beautiful products to shaping complete luxury experiences. What started as a love for materials has evolved into an ecosystem built on restoration, storytelling, and meaningful collaborations. Today, her ventures support one another, combining craftsmanship with conscious consumption. Sara’s story is one of growth, resilience, and redefining how India understands and enjoys luxury.


Founder of Bag Begum


Explore the Art of Conscious Luxury with Sara Baijnath in Our Exclusive Interview


From NIFT Delhi to Da Milano to your own ventures, how has your work evolved from creating objects to architecting entire brand experiences?


My journey from NIFT Delhi to leading design at Da Milano, and later building my own ventures—Baeledo, Luxury Leather Love, Bag Begum India, and SachaBana—has been an evolution from creating luxury objects to architecting entire brand experiences. At NIFT, I honed my foundation in craftsmanship and material innovation—understanding how leather could be elevated into timeless, functional art. My experience at Da Milano refined that sensibility, teaching me how design decisions influence scale, consistency, and luxury perception. With Beledo, I took my first entrepreneurial leap, learning how creativity, commerce, and operations converge to build a brand from the ground up.


When I founded Luxury Leather Love and Bag Begum India, my role expanded from being a designer to becoming a storyteller and strategist. I moved from designing handbags to shaping how people experience luxury—whether that’s through restoring heritage pieces or educating consumers about conscious luxury through digital media. With SachaBana, where we’ve designed capsule collections for brands like Siddartha Tytler and Farak, I explored the nuances of balancing individuality with commercial appeal—learning how to merge creativity with strategic business thinking. Today, my work isn’t just about creating—it’s about crafting ecosystems where design, sustainability, and storytelling coexist seamlessly.



Owner of Luxury Leather Love


You run three businesses that seem beautifully interconnected. How did you conceptualize this circular ecosystem between Luxury Leather Love, Bag Begum, and Sacha Bana?


The conceptualization of this circular ecosystem honestly happened quite organically—maybe by fluke, or maybe just through experience guiding me toward the right steps. When I had to shut Baeledo down, I didn’t want to stop my factory from running. Anyone who’s worked in manufacturing knows that once a factory shuts down, restarting it is almost impossible. That’s how Luxury Leather Love was born. I realized there was a gap in the market—people invest so much money in luxury handbags, and a minor issue often means they end up discarding them. As a bag designer and manufacturer, I knew how simple most of these fixes actually were. So I turned that insight into a sustainable, service-based business that not only met a market need but also kept my factory operational. While Luxury Leather Love sustained the manufacturing arm, I found myself creatively restless. Having grown up watching my mother as a radio jockey and host, I’ve always had an affinity for media and conversation. That’s how Bag Begum came into being—a podcast and digital platform where I could explore my passion for luxury storytelling, conscious consumption, and the cultural side of fashion. What’s interesting is how everything came full circle. Through Bag Begum, I began connecting with fashion designers who specialized in clothing and wanted to collaborate on handbag lines. Those collaborations inspired SachaBana, my design label that bridges creativity, craftsmanship, and commerce. Today, each venture feeds into the other—Luxury Leather Love keeps the production ecosystem alive, Bag Begum fuels creative visibility and relationships, and SachaBana brings those synergies to life through capsule collections. Together, they form a self-sustaining circular ecosystem where design, storytelling, and business feed into one another and co-exist.
Sara Baijnath-Founder of Bag Begum

The conceptualization of this circular ecosystem honestly happened quite organically—maybe by fluke, or maybe just through experience guiding me toward the right steps. When I had to shut Baeledo down, I didn’t want to stop my factory from running. Anyone who’s worked in manufacturing knows that once a factory shuts down, restarting it is almost impossible.


That’s how Luxury Leather Love was born. I realized there was a gap in the market—people invest so much money in luxury handbags, and a minor issue often means they end up discarding them. As a bag designer and manufacturer, I knew how simple most of these fixes actually were. So I turned that insight into a sustainable, service-based business that not only met a market need but also kept my factory operational.


While Luxury Leather Love sustained the manufacturing arm, I found myself creatively restless. Having grown up watching my mother as a radio jockey and host, I’ve always had an affinity for media and conversation. That’s how Bag Begum came into being—a podcast and digital platform where I could explore my passion for luxury storytelling, conscious consumption, and the cultural side of fashion. What’s interesting is how everything came full circle. Through Bag Begum, I began connecting with fashion designers who specialized in clothing and wanted to collaborate on handbag lines. Those collaborations inspired SachaBana, my design label that bridges creativity, craftsmanship, and commerce.


Today, each venture feeds into the other—Luxury Leather Love keeps the production ecosystem alive, Bag Begum fuels creative visibility and relationships, and SachaBana brings those synergies to life through capsule collections. Together, they form a self-sustaining circular ecosystem where design, storytelling, and business feed into one another and co-exist.



Luxury Leather Restoration


Leading as Head Designer at Da Milano so early in your career must’ve been transformative — what did that role teach you about luxury and design leadership?


My time in the luxury industry taught me the true meaning of hard work. It grounded me in the fundamentals—how to survive and thrive within a manufacturing ecosystem and understand every layer of production. I owe a great deal of my values and professional ethos to my mentor, Mr. Malik, father of Sahil Malik, whom I had the incredible opportunity to learn from during my time at Da Milano.


He taught me not just about design or product, but about growth, leadership, and integrity—and those lessons have shaped every entrepreneurial decision I’ve made since. When I eventually started my own ventures, there were moments I had to unlearn certain habits and approaches to find my authentic voice as a founder. I now realize that mentorship gives you direction, but true evolution comes from knowing when to step away from the copycat culture and carve your own path. That balance between learning and unlearning has defined my journey as a luxury entrepreneur and designer.


Luxury Bags

How did your experience with Baeledo change your understanding of building and sustaining a brand in the luxury space?


It was truly a massive growth journey for me. Coming straight out of an incredibly taxing job and diving into entrepreneurship felt a bit like jumping from the frying pan into the fire—intense, uncertain, but transformative. The early days were filled with relentless hard work and learning curves. One of the biggest lessons I learned was that passion fades, but consistency stays. As a founder, I had to regulate myself—there was no boss or structure to keep me on track. That kind of freedom can often feel like guilt, because when you’re demotivated or not at your best, you still have to find ways to show up for your business. Self-discipline became my greatest challenge and, ultimately, my biggest teacher. From a business standpoint, it also taught me to understand the luxury bag market in India—to see the difference between need and want. We achieved a turnover of over ₹1 crore in our very first year, which proved the demand was there. But sustaining that required rethinking everything: avoiding copycat culture, identifying what truly made us unique, building sharper marketing strategies, and learning how to manage pricing and costing in a country that’s deeply price-conscious. Looking back, that phase taught me resilience, clarity, and how to balance creativity with commercial intelligence—skills that continue to shape me as a luxury entrepreneur today.
Sara Baijnath's Experience with Baeledo

It was truly a massive growth journey for me. Coming straight out of an incredibly taxing job and diving into entrepreneurship felt a bit like jumping from the frying pan into the fire—intense, uncertain, but transformative. The early days were filled with relentless hard work and learning curves. One of the biggest lessons I learned was that passion fades, but consistency stays. As a founder, I had to regulate myself—there was no boss or structure to keep me on track. That kind of freedom can often feel like guilt, because when you’re demotivated or not at your best, you still have to find ways to show up for your business. Self-discipline became my greatest challenge and, ultimately, my biggest teacher.


From a business standpoint, it also taught me to understand the luxury bag market in India—to see the difference between need and want. We achieved a turnover of over ₹1 crore in our very first year, which proved the demand was there. But sustaining that required rethinking everything: avoiding copycat culture, identifying what truly made us unique, building sharper marketing strategies, and learning how to manage pricing and costing in a country that’s deeply price-conscious. Looking back, that phase taught me resilience, clarity, and how to balance creativity with commercial intelligence—skills that continue to shape me as a luxury entrepreneur today.



Founder of Sacha Bana


Sacha Bana provides end-to-end design solutions for emerging brands. What’s your process for translating a client’s vision into a luxury product?


The first thing I do is really spend time understanding the person or brand I’m designing for. It’s important for me to get a sense of their energy, their aesthetic, and their personality—because every design should feel like an authentic extension of who they are. Honestly, it starts from day one: I observe their mannerisms, their preferences, and try to get into their mindset. Once that foundation is set, I move into the design process—and for me, that always begins with sketching. Sketching is to a designer what writing is to a writer—it’s the most essential form of expression. I usually work on my iPad, sketching freely to translate raw ideas into form. From there, I experiment with materials, testing which leathers or textures complement the design best. Next comes pattern making and prototyping—checking proportions, sizing, durability, and functionality, especially since handbags require a balance between structure and usability. Aesthetics are important, but so is how the bag performs in everyday life. Once the prototype feels right, we move into sampling, bringing the vision to life. The final step is always the most rewarding—presenting the collection to the client. Luckily, every collaboration so far has been met with pure excitement and joy. From there, it’s their move to take the collection forward—whether that means launching, marketing, or producing it with my support.
Sara Baijnath-Founder of Sacha Bana

​​The first thing I do is really spend time understanding the person or brand I’m designing for. It’s important for me to get a sense of their energy, their aesthetic, and their personality—because every design should feel like an authentic extension of who they are. Honestly, it starts from day one: I observe their mannerisms, their preferences, and try to get into their mindset.


Once that foundation is set, I move into the design process—and for me, that always begins with sketching. Sketching is to a designer what writing is to a writer—it’s the most essential form of expression. I usually work on my iPad, sketching freely to translate raw ideas into form. From there, I experiment with materials, testing which leathers or textures complement the design best. Next comes pattern making and prototyping—checking proportions, sizing, durability, and functionality, especially since handbags require a balance between structure and usability. Aesthetics are important, but so is how the bag performs in everyday life.


Once the prototype feels right, we move into sampling, bringing the vision to life. The final step is always the most rewarding—presenting the collection to the client. Luckily, every collaboration so far has been met with pure excitement and joy. From there, it’s their move to take the collection forward—whether that means launching, marketing, or producing it with my support.



Sustainable Luxury Handbags

Luxury Leather Love is an inspiring initiative rooted in restoration and anti-consumerism. What has been the most memorable restoration story or client experience so far?


Honestly, there are just so many stories that stay with you when you know you’re on the right track. Working in this space has shown me how emotional and impactful the idea of restoring luxury can be. Yes, at its core, Luxury Leather Love is rooted in anti-consumerism—a philosophy that’s not only better for the environment but also aligns deeply with sustainable, slow fashion. It’s something I truly believe is part of our Indian DNA. Our mothers have always been the original sustainability champions—reusing jars, saving packaging, keeping things for years. I just applied that same sentiment to luxury handbags. Why discard something valuable when a little care can make it timeless again? For me, this work is my way of giving back—to both people and the planet. There have been many memorable moments, but one that stands out was when a couple came to me after losing their daughter, who had been a bag enthusiast. They brought in all her handbags to be restored and revived, wanting to preserve those tangible memories of her. It was one of the most emotional experiences of my career—turning grief into something lasting and beautiful. We’ve also had the privilege of restoring pieces for some incredible names, including Masaba Gupta, Samantha Prabhu, and director Kabir Khan. Ranveer Singh follows our work, and Bhavna Pandey (Ananya Pandey’s mother) has been a supporter as well. Even Smriti Irani personally reached out to appreciate what we’re doing, calling it both exciting and commendable. At the end of the day, I truly believe when you try to do good, good finds its way back to you—and Luxury Leather Love is proof of that.
Sara Baijnath-Founder of Luxury Leather Love

Honestly, there are just so many stories that stay with you when you know you’re on the right track. Working in this space has shown me how emotional and impactful the idea of restoring luxury can be. Yes, at its core, Luxury Leather Love is rooted in anti-consumerism—a philosophy that’s not only better for the environment but also aligns deeply with sustainable, slow fashion.

It’s something I truly believe is part of our Indian DNA. Our mothers have always been the original sustainability champions—reusing jars, saving packaging, keeping things for years. I just applied that same sentiment to luxury handbags. Why discard something valuable when a little care can make it timeless again? For me, this work is my way of giving back—to both people and the planet.


There have been many memorable moments, but one that stands out was when a couple came to me after losing their daughter, who had been a bag enthusiast. They brought in all her handbags to be restored and revived, wanting to preserve those tangible memories of her. It was one of the most emotional experiences of my career—turning grief into something lasting and beautiful.


We’ve also had the privilege of restoring pieces for some incredible names, including Masaba Gupta, Samantha Prabhu, and director Kabir Khan. Ranveer Singh follows our work, and Bhavna Pandey (Ananya Pandey’s mother) has been a supporter as well. Even Smriti Irani personally reached out to appreciate what we’re doing, calling it both exciting and commendable.

At the end of the day, I truly believe when you try to do good, good finds its way back to you—and Luxury Leather Love is proof of that.


Designer Leather Bags


Bag Begum blends storytelling, insight, and community. How did you envision it as more than just a content platform?


I honestly didn’t even realize what it was becoming when I started — it just began as a page. But over time, I realized what it means to actually change people’s perspectives. When people began reaching out to ask questions — about where their products are made, how they’re made, what’s good quality, what’s worth the money — I knew something was shifting. The way my community has grown, and continues to grow, is proof that India is emerging as a luxury superpower. People don’t just want to own luxury anymore — they want to understand it. They want to be informed consumers. And that’s exactly what Bag Begum stands for. We cannot be fooled, and luxury watchdogs like me will make sure we aren’t.
Story Behind Bag Begum

I honestly didn’t even realize what it was becoming when I started — it just began as a page. But over time, I realized what it means to actually change people’s perspectives. When people began reaching out to ask questions — about where their products are made, how they’re made, what’s good quality, what’s worth the money — I knew something was shifting.


The way my community has grown, and continues to grow, is proof that India is emerging as a luxury superpower. People don’t just want to own luxury anymore — they want to understand it. They want to be informed consumers. And that’s exactly what Bag Begum stands for. We cannot be fooled, and luxury watchdogs like me will make sure we aren’t.


Luxury Handbag Brands India


When you think of your long-term vision, what do you hope your ecosystem — Luxury Leather Love, Bag Begum, and Sacha Bana — will stand for in the next decade?


Honestly, at the end of the day, everything is still a business. I want Luxury Leather Love to become India’s number one leading restoration and repair unit for luxury. I want to make Bag Begum a very well-known name in every household that consumes luxury, so that people are making the right choice when they’re spending so much money on a purchase. And for Sacha Bana, the aim is to keep growing, doing more collaborations with new designers, helping them create new lines of bags, and maybe later, hopefully, starting Sacha Bana as a designer label of my own. So yeah, the end goal is always to make money though — haha, just kidding; or am I?
Sara Baijnath-Future Vision

Honestly, at the end of the day, everything is still a business. I want Luxury Leather Love to become India’s number one leading restoration and repair unit for luxury. I want to make Bag Begum a very well-known name in every household that consumes luxury, so that people are making the right choice when they’re spending so much money on a purchase.


And for Sacha Bana, the aim is to keep growing, doing more collaborations with new designers, helping them create new lines of bags, and maybe, hopefully, starting Sacha Bana as a designer label of my own. So yeah, the end goal is always to make money though — haha, just kidding; or am I?


Sara Baijnath Business

In the decade ahead, Sara Baijnath envisions Luxury Leather Love as India’s leading restoration unit, Bag Begum as a trusted luxury voice, and Sacha Bana as a powerhouse of creative collaborations. Her mission is to shape thoughtful, sustainable luxury experiences that transform how consumers buy, preserve, and truly value their possessions.


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Uncover Insights Into Sara Baijnath, Along With Key Details About The Founder Of Bag Begum And The Visionary Owner Of Luxury Leather Love. Explore The World Of Luxury Leather Restoration, Learn About Luxury Bags, And Discover The Creative Mind Behind Sacha Bana. Dive Into The Realm Of Sustainable Luxury Handbags, And Admire Premium Designer Leather Bags. Get A Closer Look At Sara Baijnath’s Business At Delhi Royale Luxury Lifestyle Blog https://www.delhiroyale.in/luxury-lifestyle-blog

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