YB
About YB
YEN BYCKOVSKI
Hello, it's me, fashion designer Yen Byckovski
For fourteen years now, these are the words I've been uttering, addressing my beloved audience. For fourteen years, all my life experiences, events, and thoughts have been channeled into designing products and marketing concepts for the well-known brand BYCKOVSKI. But how did it all begin? And how did I manage to turn my surname into a brand? I will share with you my own memories, dedicated to the first significant anniversary. BYCKOVSKI 10 years!
It seems there's nothing surprising about me getting into design and sewing. Ever since kindergarten, and later, during my school years, after classes, I always went to my mom's workplace where we did homework together, and then I would "climb the walls" out of boredom waiting for the end of the workday. I learned to fill the voids in my leisure time by reading books, engaging in art, and conversing with adults on various topics...
The historical photo of the sewing factory that determined my destiny.
The historical photo of the sewing factory. A photo taken from the main entrance of the factory.
The B&W TV in the dressing room didn't always work, or more precisely, only when the white minibus of the director of my seventh-grade school wasn't parked by the window. He, being friends with the director of the sewing factory, would leave it inside the factory courtyard, where my mom worked as the manager of the medical department. The factory was large, and every day something or other was happening in the sewing workshops. On such occasions, I never missed the opportunity to accompany my mom on her visits. For me, it was an unthinkable luxury to miss another chance to admire the production machinery, mechanisms, and tools. Although I was very young to understand all the technical processes, with each visit, everything became more familiar and understandable. My mom often sewed at home. To this day, I cherish a couple of magnificent pieces made by her. My grandmother also sewed, as did the neighbors — everyone was sewing something. Therefore, when I sat down at the sewing machine, it wasn't by chance but by inevitability.
In general, as it's evident even now, all I had left back then was to wait for a reason to sit down at the sewing machine myself. And of course, such a reason arose...
You can't connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backwards.
In 2011, I graduated from the eleventh grade of high school, and by that time, I had been preparing for admission to medical university for two years. This idea wasn't mine, and it didn't excite me either. You see, in 2008, I discovered the world of visual graphics. Graffiti, calligraphy, and all sorts of fonts in general. The world of creativity captured my mind, and when I imagined myself holding a scalpel or elevator instead of a brush, marker, or pencil, I felt uncomfortable. I felt a persistent reluctance to live someone else's life instead of my own.
That's why I didn't register for the subjects I was being prepared to study for admission, and instead, I took exams suitable for architecture. I knew how much money my parents had spent for me to become a doctor even before my admission. But I couldn't do anything about it because ultimately, we only have ourselves, and in the end, we are solely responsible for the decisions we make. My plan failed. I fell seriously ill, and I went to the tests only to randomly fill out the questionnaires. My mind was blank, and I was sure I had made a mistake by not listening to my parents. Fortunately, probability theory was on my side the day I received the results. It turned out that I did quite well, and my scores were enough to get into any university. That's how I accidentally ended up in university to study to become a psychologist and a teacher of Hand&craft for girls.
Donation for development. It will be a very long story, and of course, I'll be grateful if you read it to the end.
I'll also be thankful for your donation; all funds from which I will spend on expanding the park of technology and equipment. Additionally, your name will be placed on the equipment purchased with your donation, so I'll never forget who to be thankful to. Thank you for believing in my idea and talent. Yen Byckovski.
A photo taken at the very moment when I first sat down at the sewing machine. Back then, it was just a photo, but today I'm happy to have it in my collection.
There, for the first time, I threaded a sewing needle and, taking the sheets of graph paper handed out by the teacher, began to stitch the first stitches along the lines on the paper. Bright red threads pierced the squares of the paper with each step of the needle, securely binding two sheets together. This process fascinated me with its simplicity and elegance. It was at this point that the magic happened, filling me with the energy to create, even after all this time. And so, after the first lesson in sewing technology, I dashed home to come back as quickly as possible and try to sew a backpack. Practicing stitching on pages from a semi-shared notebook, while useful, was such a boring activity. Especially now that I knew how to thread a needle, what use was it to me? It was time to move on. On the way home, I pondered the pattern and details, where to find the fabric, and how, in the end, to sew something decent.
At home, in our closets, we stored a lot of fabric, scraps, and old clothes. Some of the scraps were even mine personally. In 2010, there was a trend for shorts with cuffs that could be made by buying some LEVI’s 501s from a thrift store. Because I grew up in a sewing factory, friends and acquaintances started coming to me to hem and alter their clothes, fortunately, I had many seamstress acquaintances. So, I would modestly charge for my work, but along with that, my room's closet accumulated a large number of paired denim scraps. Opening the closet, I realized it was my goldmine. There was the first fabric for my first creation... However, it took me two long months to sew it; my mom's sewing machine simply couldn't handle the thickness of the material I naively tried to sew. I had to sew almost entirely by hand, breaking a huge number of household sewing needles in the process.
A photo of my first creation. (Due to a lack of funds for a digital camera, I took photos of my work on film.)
In the end, the backpack was ready, and it truly made an incredible impression on all my friends and acquaintances. Surprised at how it turned out, I began to accept rare orders from friends for the design and tailoring of something exclusive. Yes, at that moment, I found myself in the right place at the right time. The thing is, from 2010 onwards, the countries of the CIS were swept by a wave of new trends. One of the most dominant was the "Hipsters" trend. It was the influence of this trend that gave rise to so many barbershops, and perhaps it's the only thing that remained in culture after the hipster trend faded. But along with barbershops, the trend awakened people to pay attention to everything homemade, interesting, and unique, not found on the shelves of standard stores. It was truly the best time to start. And when I say "the best", I mean it sincerely.
To delve into this fashion world, my good old friend Nikita Losev helped me. An exquisite fashionista and incredibly talented artist, he was nearby and influenced my worldview and understanding of beauty.
In the same year, I made the decision to organize a workshop because cutting on the floor and sewing at home turned out to be too inconvenient. In the basement of our apartment building, we had a room of about 15 square meters, filled with construction materials from previous repairs and my father's belongings, stacked to the ceiling with clutter.
To clear out the junk, everyone helped, even the guys from the neighborhood, rough adults beyond their years but with a human soul, the kind that not everyone possesses today. I am grateful to all of them, all those people who supported and inspired me. I am forever indebted to them.
In the same year, I made the decision to organize a workshop because cutting on the floor and sewing at home turned out to be too inconvenient. In the basement of our apartment building, we had a room of about 15 square meters, filled with construction materials from previous repairs and my father's belongings, stacked to the ceiling with clutter.
To clear out the junk, everyone helped, even the guys from the neighborhood, rough adults beyond their years but with a human soul, the kind that not everyone possesses today. I am grateful to all of them, all those people who supported and inspired me. I am forever indebted to them.
Donation for development. It will be a very long story, and of course, I'll be grateful if you read it to the end.
I'll also be thankful for your donation; all funds from which I will spend on expanding the park of technology and equipment. Additionally, your name will be placed on the equipment purchased with your donation, so I'll never forget who to be thankful to. Thank you for believing in my idea and talent. Yen Byckovski.
But cleaning up the premises was not yet organizing a workshop because I needed a lot of money to buy special equipment and materials. I made the decision to sell my only computer and my mobile phone just to continue moving towards my goal. My friend, a popular tattoo artist who also served as my mentor, gave me a Zenit film camera, with which I started capturing my first content. Yes, in 2012, I bought film and had it developed at the only lab in the center of my hometown.
With the proceeds from selling my belongings, I purchased a couple of leather hides, and my friend Pavel Savchits brought his domestic sewing machine from home. When his mother found out about it, she made him take it back.
With the proceeds from selling my belongings, I purchased a couple of leather hides, and my friend Pavel Savchits brought his domestic sewing machine from home. When his mother found out about it, she made him take it back.
In 2012, while sewing my first bow ties, photo by Marina Kuchuk.
During that time, I started attending the Pentecostal church and gained many kind and supportive friends who, for a symbolic fee or just for the cost of materials, commissioned various designs of backpacks from me. I happily fulfilled all orders, even though I didn't make any profit from them, because it quickly helped me gain skill and experience. One day, I was invited to a party where the dress code called for a bow tie. I didn't have one, so I decided to sew it myself—a true DIY project. When I arrived at the party, everyone admired its appearance and expressed interest in having something similar. Sewing bow ties was easier for me since I still didn't have proper equipment to sew backpacks or bags. And this trend was much more manageable and understandable in those naive years.
I decided to return to making bags a little later when I could gather enough funds for suitable equipment. In the same year, Pavel Savchits decided to help me more often; he liked my idea, and I immensely liked it too. In our city, there was a shop selling Italian fabrics, and while the prices were painfully high, it was one of the few places where you couldn't take your eyes off each fabric. I used all my available funds to purchase as much material as possible to expand the catalog of my products. To save additional money, I personally traveled to Minsk for meetings with my clients. Thanks to this decision, I could meet all my clients face-to-face, and with the saved money from delivery, I could purchase additional fabric volume. One day, a client asked me, "How many bow ties do you have with you?" I always carried more items with me because I felt that if I was prepared to offer something, someday someone would be interested.
had 24 additional bow ties with me, which I specifically made for shooting the logo of my brand "QVADRAT QRUQ", and that guy bought them all at once. With the money I earned, I immediately went to buy: riveter, dies, rivets, cutting tools. I realized that now I could work even more efficiently, and also that I had equipment for sewing bags. So I worked for another year, steadily building up inventory and saving money for sewing machines.
On January 28, 2014, I threw a big party for my 20th birthday, invited many guests, and asked them all to give me sewing machines as gifts. Also, my grandmother gave me a sewing machine for working with knitted fabrics. The deacon from the village church, where I served as an assistant pastor, also gave me a large arm shoe machine. My workshop was filling up with equipment.
On January 28, 2014, I threw a big party for my 20th birthday, invited many guests, and asked them all to give me sewing machines as gifts. Also, my grandmother gave me a sewing machine for working with knitted fabrics. The deacon from the village church, where I served as an assistant pastor, also gave me a large arm shoe machine. My workshop was filling up with equipment.
In the spring of 2014, I decided to attend the Belarusian Fashion Week in Minsk, as I had no idea what it was about and what people and designers were doing there. There was nothing particularly inspiring about it, except that I had not yet tried sewing clothes. Upon returning home, I began preparing my first capsule collection. A dress with a belt, a skirt, a tank top, trousers, two clutches, a backpack, a hat, and a blouse. For the photo shoot with three models, I decided to use a river motif - we did the photo shoot on a boat, which unfortunately I didn't have the budget to rent. At that time, my friend Marina Kuchuk helped me a lot, and I am very grateful to her for that to this day.
Two months later, I managed to obtain a visa, and I planned my first trip to Warsaw. I wanted to see it, to be inspired, perhaps there was something I hadn't seen yet that could significantly influence my creativity. Unfortunately, the visa was only for 3 days, and I didn't have much money for the trip, but I decided to go anyway - it was my main dream of the decade. I took more goods with me and set off as a passenger with someone who was transporting bicycles from Poland at that time. Upon arrival in Warsaw, I spread out my goods in the city center and sold 3 bow ties and one hat, which was enough for me to cover accommodation and meals. I walked around the shops, seizing every opportunity to sketch out the patterns of the items that interested me, take photos, and make notes. It was an extremely productive trip that inspired me to continue my journey.
Back in Belarus, I returned inspired to create and make my products popular. While in Warsaw, I set a goal to dedicate my entire life to this noble cause. My products were already beautiful, but after seeing how beautiful packaging could also be, I began to think about it. I needed brown wrapping paper, but I didn't even know what it was called, although I remembered that doctors used something similar to extract sterile instruments. I remembered this from childhood when I walked from room to room in the medical unit of the sewing factory where my mother worked. The question was resolved - I started riding my bicycle to clinics around the city, collecting all the papers of this type that doctors carefully preserved for me. Everything seemed to be helping me, and everyone wanted to assist me. I obtained an inkwell for stamps half a year earlier - I found an old Soviet inkwell in an abandoned room in the Chernobyl zone. I knew it would come in handy for stamping. Printing on a printer was simply not within my budget.
I used the same method for advertising. Later, I found out that this type of paper is called "kraft paper," and it turned out that its price was extremely low. I ordered several packs for myself, which I carried in my hands for several weeks as I needed to go to Minsk. I only hitchhiked to Minsk; I couldn't afford anything else. On the purchased paper, I printed advertisements using a risograph, which I also had to paste up myself. The design was drawn by Dima Sku, a talented graphic artist and musician, at my request. I even made glue at home from starch just to save a penny for my business. Residents sent photos, wrote, and ordered products. I saw that with an unconventional approach to work, I saved a large amount of budget, which I could allocate to the purchase of materials and equipment, something my competitors definitely didn't do. At that moment, I learned a lesson for myself: either pay with intellect or with capital.
I vividly realized that if I wanted to create something significant, I needed to learn somewhere, seek expert opinions and experiences. I learned that we had a leathercraft master in our city who had dedicated his whole life to this craft. I managed to find his number, my heart pounding, but I mustered the courage to dial. A modest "Hello" came from the other end of the line. I introduced myself and told him a little about myself, but when I began asking him about the nuances of working with leather... Unfortunately, he didn't explain anything to me. That call was fateful, but at that moment it seemed useless and futile. Later, a year passed, and the master sent me the following message: "I like your determination... keep it up. Learn new technologies and methods of processing materials. Of course, there is something interesting in your simple, unpretentious works, but your attitude and faith inspire me more."
The fabric from the sofa mentioned in my story is on the flap of the sewn backpack.
Each type of visual aid has pros and cons that must be evaluated to ensure it will be beneficial to the overall presentation. Before incorporating visual aids into speeches, the speaker should understand that if used incorrectly, the visual will not be an aid, but a distraction.
Planning ahead is important when using visual aids. It is necessary to choose a visual aid that is appropriate for the material and audience. The purpose of the visual aid is to enhance the presentation. Each type of visual aid has pros and cons that must be evaluated to ensure it will be beneficial to the overall presentation. Before incorporating visual aids into speeches, the speaker should understand that if used incorrectly, the visual will not be an aid, but a distraction. Planning ahead is important when using visual aids. It is necessary to choose a visual aid that is appropriate for the material and audience. The purpose of the visual aid is to enhance the presentation.
Planning ahead is important when using visual aids. It is necessary to choose a visual aid that is appropriate for the material and audience. The purpose of the visual aid is to enhance the presentation. Each type of visual aid has pros and cons that must be evaluated to ensure it will be beneficial to the overall presentation. Before incorporating visual aids into speeches, the speaker should understand that if used incorrectly, the visual will not be an aid, but a distraction. Planning ahead is important when using visual aids. It is necessary to choose a visual aid that is appropriate for the material and audience. The purpose of the visual aid is to enhance the presentation.
That same summer, I decided to undertake repairs in the workshop. After all, the old, dilapidated basement with its crooked concrete floor, pits, and holes in the walls through which rodents sometimes ran did not inspire calm, measured creative work. I asked my friend Pavel Savchits to help with this, and he didn't refuse. We calculated that there would be enough spare change for repairs, but oh, how wrong we were. I had a couple of hundred dollars for this. But when even that wasn't enough to level the floor, I was truly dismayed. To patch the pipes and holes in the walls, I needed drywall, which Pavel and I carried on the city bus from the hardware store. It was a strange feeling when huge sheets of chalk covered with paper stood next to ordinary passengers. And when people looked at me and wondered if I had gone crazy. But what else could I do?Front matter, or preliminaries, is the first section of a book and is usually the smallest section in terms of the number of pages. Each page is counted, but no folio or page number is expressed or printed, on either display pages or blank pages.
To produce perfect books, these rules have to be brought back to life and applied.
To produce perfect books, these rules have to be brought back to life and applied.
The work had to move forward, and stopping because I didn't have money for delivery was an unacceptable luxury. I had to lay all the electrical wiring myself as well. I am still grateful to my high school physics teacher, Oleg Dmitrievich Zhuk, who taught us this theory back in the eighth grade. Ten years later, we met at the brand's coffee shop, and I expressed my immense gratitude to him. The repairs were not fast because I did them with the money earned from orders. But it was so nice when neighbors visited me and said that my basement looked better than their homes. I didn't have internet either, so I made an arrangement with a neighbor on the 3rd floor whose Wi-Fi was the only one that my old first-generation iPad could catch, which I bought to be able to process orders.
While working on the repairs, I continued refining my craftsmanship. One day, my friend, the photographer Marina Kuchuk, approached me and handed me two hundred thousand rubles, asking me to design and sew a bag according to my taste. It was a substantial sum, and after purchasing materials, I began pondering what the bag should look like. I directed the extra funds towards continuing the workshop renovations. For two long months, I struggled to create something worthwhile. Materials ran out, but nothing seemed to come together. Frustrated one summer day, I vowed not to leave the workshop until I produced something truly beautiful for Marina.
After twelve hours of intense work, I birthed and sewed my first universally acclaimed hit, the "Kuchuk Bag." Marina loved it immensely, as did almost my entire, albeit small, audience following my creative journey. The Kuchuk Bag became the most mass-produced bag in the first five years of my career, with over a hundred thousand units sold. The proceeds from this success eventually allowed me to establish a full-fledged leather goods factory. Years later, I exchanged the original bag with Marina for a new one. The original Kuchuk Bag was displayed in the brand's store in the city of Baranovichi for some time.
The Kuchuk Bag was the first bag bearing my logo, BYCKOVSKI. It became a symbol of my journey, and in the future, we will reissue it in limited quantities, paying homage to the achievements of the past decades.
After twelve hours of intense work, I birthed and sewed my first universally acclaimed hit, the "Kuchuk Bag." Marina loved it immensely, as did almost my entire, albeit small, audience following my creative journey. The Kuchuk Bag became the most mass-produced bag in the first five years of my career, with over a hundred thousand units sold. The proceeds from this success eventually allowed me to establish a full-fledged leather goods factory. Years later, I exchanged the original bag with Marina for a new one. The original Kuchuk Bag was displayed in the brand's store in the city of Baranovichi for some time.
The Kuchuk Bag was the first bag bearing my logo, BYCKOVSKI. It became a symbol of my journey, and in the future, we will reissue it in limited quantities, paying homage to the achievements of the past decades.
Realizing that I still had the skills to repair my strategic assets, I increasingly entertained the idea of finding an old space in the city center and transforming it into a permanent store where customers could touch everything, get to know me, and my creations. I searched for several months until I stumbled upon a "rollet" on the second floor of the city's "October" cinema. The owner of the "rollet" offered me two options: either pay a hundred dollars rent per month or buy it outright for five hundred dollars. The only thing left to think about was where to get the money to buy it. The math was straightforward and clear. It was a "curiosity shop" rollet, which I envisioned transforming into the most beautiful designer showroom in the city.
Each type of visual aid has pros and cons that must be evaluated to ensure it will be beneficial to the overall presentation. Before incorporating visual aids into speeches, the speaker should understand that if used incorrectly, the visual will not be an aid, but a distraction.
Planning ahead is important when using visual aids. It is necessary to choose a visual aid that is appropriate for the material and audience. The purpose of the visual aid is to enhance the presentation. Each type of visual aid has pros and cons that must be evaluated to ensure it will be beneficial to the overall presentation. Before incorporating visual aids into speeches, the speaker should understand that if used incorrectly, the visual will not be an aid, but a distraction. Planning ahead is important when using visual aids. It is necessary to choose a visual aid that is appropriate for the material and audience. The purpose of the visual aid is to enhance the presentation.
Each type of visual aid has pros and cons that must be evaluated to ensure it will be beneficial to the overall presentation. Before incorporating visual aids into speeches, the speaker should understand that if used incorrectly, the visual will not be an aid, but a distraction.
Planning ahead is important when using visual aids. It is necessary to choose a visual aid that is appropriate for the material and audience. The purpose of the visual aid is to enhance the presentation. Each type of visual aid has pros and cons that must be evaluated to ensure it will be beneficial to the overall presentation. Before incorporating visual aids into speeches, the speaker should understand that if used incorrectly, the visual will not be an aid, but a distraction. Planning ahead is important when using visual aids. It is necessary to choose a visual aid that is appropriate for the material and audience. The purpose of the visual aid is to enhance the presentation.
Contemplating this task, I shared it with my former classmate and friend, Andrei Pyatiletov, who often participated in our photoshoots as a model. I offered him a share in the showroom with the condition that he would trade in it on Sundays (when I was always serving in the church), while I planned to do it myself on all other days except Monday, which was my day off. He agreed, investing seven hundred dollars. Now, I just needed to find my own seven hundred to invest equally. I turned to my friend Tamuna Mtsuravishvili for my seven hundred, and she was able to lend me the money. On the same day, I and Andrei bought out the rollet and began to estimate the cost of repairs.
Pavel Savchits is helping me with the renovation.
The sign for the showroom was quoted at seven hundred and fifty dollars, which frightened me, but didn't stop me. It was decided to develop drawings and technology to make it ourselves. Furniture prices were also prohibitive, and it became clear that we would have to do everything by hand. Two people greatly helped me with the repairs: Pasha Myadel, who was always there during the renovation and never refused to help, and Pavel Kukharchik, a kind and responsive friend who sold me wallpaper at a lower price and volunteered to hang them because I didn't want to take risks without experience. I bought laminate flooring from various stores in suitable colors, which allowed me to save a considerable amount. My skills in visual arts were extremely useful. They allowed me to save a lot of money and achieve the desired result without financial expenses. In those days, I learned the most important rule of my life: "If you don't know how to do something, you must know how to pay for it." And one important conversation stuck with me, which took place among the three of us while Pavel Kukharchik was hanging wallpaper in my showroom. Myadel shared his life plans and said he wanted to do only what he liked in life. Then Pavel Kukharchik got off his stool and said the following: "Do you think life is always about doing what you like? Do you think I enjoy hanging wallpaper right now? Life is about doing what you don't like today so that everything will be enjoyable later..." These words pierced me, and I remember them every time I lack the strength to do what I don't like for the sake of achieving a distant but desired result. And I really didn't like hauling building materials to the city center on the bus, meeting acquaintances in work clothes in the city, while all my classmates were getting higher education, and I, having retrieved documents from the university, was building my own fairy tale world...
I marvel even today at how in key and pivotal moments of the brand's development, there was always someone with a camera next to me. Each of the stories now has a photo confirming its uniqueness. It was the same on the day when the interior renovation of the showroom was already completed, and all that remained was to deal with the sign above the shop. As I mentioned earlier, the prices for custom-made signs did not suit me, so I decided to make it myself. I ordered plywood letters and painted them white, bought glass, and after painting the reverse side black, achieved a deep gloss. I prepared a wooden box and mounted it above the entrance. Then it required four hands to attach the fifty-kilogram glass with the glued letters to the mounted box above the entrance. The process was nerve-wracking and tested our physical abilities to the limit, but we managed it. Pavel Myadel and I truly enjoyed the work we had done.
Establishing the showroom allowed me to move to the next stage in the brand's development. Now, I was not just an internet project but a brand with a physical location where people could come and see the quality and reality of the products being produced. This place generously rewarded me with new valuable connections but also demanded additional attention from me. Starting from December 2015, my schedule looked something like this: I would arrive at the showroom at 10 a.m. and engage in sales until 3 p.m. Sales were not constant; most of the time, I had to wait long periods for random customers or wait for customers who had placed orders online. However, I tried not to waste this time. I would either read or work on creating sketches. After three hours, I would either go to the workshop or hitchhike to Minsk for materials and to deliver orders waiting for customers from Minsk.Book design is the art of incorporating the content, style, format, design, and sequence of the various components of a book into a coherent whole. In the words of Jan Tschichold, "methods and rules upon which it is impossible to improve, have been developed over centuries. To produce perfect books, these rules have to be brought back to life and applied."
Front matter, or preliminaries, is the first section of a book and is usually the smallest section in terms of the number of pages. Each page is counted, but no folio or page number is expressed or printed, on either display pages or blank pages.
Front matter, or preliminaries, is the first section of a book and is usually the smallest section in terms of the number of pages. Each page is counted, but no folio or page number is expressed or printed, on either display pages or blank pages.
Since I didn't have to pay rent, there was profit every month regardless. For example, with the profit from the first month of operation, I was able to buy myself a chair for the showroom— a tall one, so it wasn't obvious that I was sitting. Before that, I could only stand in the showroom for a whole month. By the second month of operation, I could afford to order a banner with advertising in the city center, and from that point on, the recognition of my brand BYCKOVSKI probably began to grow. Sales also started to increase, and even visitors to the city began to stop by the showroom more often and with greater interest. Online, people became more eager to place orders, knowing that I was real and that there was a place where they could come and see the quality of my products for themselves. This deeply inspired me and indicated that intuitively I was doing everything right. To this day, thanks to that advertisement in the city center, people recognize me, and many local residents still remember it. It seems like just a modest photo, but look at the result it achieved!
One of the significant encounters for the brand's development was meeting Sasha Kalyuta. He and his partner came to our "October" cinema to set up a crossbow shooting range on the second floor. When we met, he told me that he used to make pet collars, but now he had no place for production. I was extremely interested in any equipment for my workshop and the opportunity for additional income in my field. So, I suggested trying to work together. Unfortunately, our collaboration didn't last long as Sasha had urgent matters and had to leave. However, as dividends for our cooperation, I received a hydraulic press, which later helped set up a large-scale production for the brand.
At the end of 2015, on December 5th, Evgeny Kovalenko contacted me.
It all started with the following message: "Zhenya, hi, do you work on orders alone? I like your approach, and you make quality products. I want to join you, help with work, I have some experience in this field."
I didn't have much time to think, so I proposed creating a joint work proposal program and invited him to a meeting in Baranovichi. Could I have imagined what this meeting would mean for me and the brand? Probably not, but I never refuse offers and to this day, I always consider them carefully. At the meeting in Baranovichi, Zhenya treated me to lunch. It surprised me, his sincerity and warmth were more important to me than anything we talked about. For some reason, in this gesture, I saw everything I needed to see in that meeting.
It all started with the following message: "Zhenya, hi, do you work on orders alone? I like your approach, and you make quality products. I want to join you, help with work, I have some experience in this field."
I didn't have much time to think, so I proposed creating a joint work proposal program and invited him to a meeting in Baranovichi. Could I have imagined what this meeting would mean for me and the brand? Probably not, but I never refuse offers and to this day, I always consider them carefully. At the meeting in Baranovichi, Zhenya treated me to lunch. It surprised me, his sincerity and warmth were more important to me than anything we talked about. For some reason, in this gesture, I saw everything I needed to see in that meeting.
After discussing all the necessary nuances of the work, Evgeny and I began working together in early 2016. I was responsible for product design, organizing production, customer interaction options, and creativity. On Evgeny's side, it was technical coordination of all processes, digitization of all data, and even acting as a driver, as I didn't have a driver's license at the time. I only drove my car for important and urgent matters and often received fines for driving without a license, which greatly upset me. We agreed to work together for three to four months, after which I would decide whether we would become partners in the future or not. I was in dire need of extra hands and an additional bright mind, if I may put it that way. Evgeny always insisted on delegating all processes and scaling up, and I agreed with him. Overall, we always had a unified understanding of every situation related to the brand's work.
(February 2, 2016, filming a video prank at the estate in Fleriyanovo.)
The first official employee.
As the tasks related to brand management grew day by day, I found myself increasingly short of time to sew, focus on creativity, and communicate with clients. It was decided to bring in the first employee to the team. That turned out to be my old friend Milan Doylidov. It might sound naive or even blunt, but I chose to invite him to work not only because he was experiencing financial difficulties at that time but also because of one significant advantage - Milan was a Roma. I knew that this people possessed exceptional creativity and resourcefulness, which Milan certainly did not lack. A good, decent, well-mannered guy with immense resourcefulness agreed to join our team as an online seller, and from that moment on, our team consisted of four people: Eugene Bychkovsky, Margarita Bychkovskaya (my first wife), Eugene Kovalenko, and Milan Doylidov.
As the tasks related to brand management grew day by day, I found myself increasingly short of time to sew, focus on creativity, and communicate with clients. It was decided to bring in the first employee to the team. That turned out to be my old friend Milan Doylidov. It might sound naive or even blunt, but I chose to invite him to work not only because he was experiencing financial difficulties at that time but also because of one significant advantage - Milan was a Roma. I knew that this people possessed exceptional creativity and resourcefulness, which Milan certainly did not lack. A good, decent, well-mannered guy with immense resourcefulness agreed to join our team as an online seller, and from that moment on, our team consisted of four people: Eugene Bychkovsky, Margarita Bychkovskaya (my first wife), Eugene Kovalenko, and Milan Doylidov.
In our efforts to develop the brand, we paid a great deal of attention to audience support, as they closely followed us. Personally, I asked each subscriber to repost and participate in contests that we held on our VKontakte pages. And they didn't refuse. It was a real goldmine for design masters of that time. Very soon, just a month after Milan joined our team, we were making 5-10 sales per day. We operated on a cash-on-delivery basis. We sent the ordered product, and as a craftsman, I received payments from customers at the post office. There were times when the post office didn't have enough money to give us all the payments, and other customers looked at me as if I were some kind of rich man. Although we lacked funds for development. At the same time, I could rarely be in the workshop in the basement of my parents' house and was more and more often traveling to leather factories and suppliers.
Milan studied at the College of Light Industry, which was also a big plus, and at my request, he managed to find another seamstress for us as an apprentice. Her name was Yanina. In the workshop, which was only twenty square meters, it was getting tighter as there were already five of us. Rita always cooked lunch for everyone, and we all gathered at our house to have a meal together. In my mind, there was an idea of building such an ideal family team where everyone would strive towards the common goal as if it were their own. Unforgettable times. There was always music playing in the workshop, the sound of sewing machines, and steam from the iron, under which the most beautiful bow ties emerged as if alive. The friendly atmosphere in the team lit up everyone's eyes and instilled the belief that one day the brand would become big and recognizable. Sometime later, about a month later, Evgeny Kovalenko suggested inviting his friend Boris Drozdovsky to join the team as a production manager. There were six of us, and at the same time, it became even tighter in our wonderful workshop.
Closer to the spring of 2016, residents of the neighboring entrance started complaining that we now had a production facility in the basement, and the chairman of the house came to me asking to vacate the workshop. I felt that this would happen sooner or later, but at the same time, it touched the strings of my soul too deeply because now we would have to pay rent for a new space, and it was not clear how big it should be. We were growing fast, but there were still no spare funds as before. Evgeny Kovalenko and I went to inspect the first hypothetical location for our workshop. We arrived at the wrong address, but it turned out that spaces were also being rented out there. After inspecting one of them, we decided to take it. It was a whopping fifty-two square meters compared to our old twenty. Later that evening, the owner of these premises called me and offered to take the second one, saying that if we took both, there would be a discount. I agreed, but inside, I was filled with fear because now we had to pay five hundred dollars every month.
We started the move with renovations. We decided to paint all the walls white, a color symbolizing hospital-like sterility and meticulous work ethic, and the floors black with deck lacquer. It turned out extremely stylish. I want to note that everyone in the team expressed a willingness to work hard and contribute to creating the new space for the BYCKOVSKI brand. We painted "BYCKOVSKI" on the walls of the production area and office. With the last of our funds, we ordered cut boards and assembled office desks and cutting tables for production ourselves. It turned out stunningly beautiful and dignified. I felt a profound surge of strength and the dawn of the brand. I knew that no one else in the country had such beauty, and we already had it. I felt that we were on the right path, that we now had our own real corner where twenty people could easily work. The production consisted of two sewing machines and the hydraulic press I had earned when I was making pet collars, but unfortunately, we couldn't bring it down to the basement because it weighed one and a half tons.
In the beginning of spring, we finally moved. We still needed to equip the office, buy phones, computers, and headphones for both existing (Milan) and new hypothetical employees. A couple of days after moving into the new office, Milan's brother Ludwig joined our team. Daniel Sharek helped us with supplying used equipment, and half a month later, he also joined our team. Meanwhile, the number of our audience on VKontakte was rapidly growing, allowing us to increase the number of orders significantly. During this period, we were making about 10-15 sales per day, which significantly contributed to the development of our brand. To find new employees for production, we posted advertisements at bus stops after work, searching for tailors, but even the cutting department couldn't keep up with the influx of customers.
In 2015, I was able to buy my first car, an old Toyota CROWN from 1983. I didn't have a driver's license, so I tried to use it only when absolutely necessary. The car was in excellent condition and had been sitting in a garage for twenty years before I bought it. I used it to get to the highway and then hitchhike to Minsk to get materials for production. Later, when Evgeny Kovalenko joined the team, we traveled the entire country in it, from one leather factory to another, to various hardware plants, and suppliers of any materials that could be useful to us. It never let me down, and I became very attached to it. It was my assistant and reliable companion. After moving to the new production facility and transporting the hydraulic press there, I decided to sell it to buy cutting dies (shaped forms of precision cutting blades) to speed up the cutting process at the factory.
This decision allowed us to fulfill orders more quickly and also to establish a stock of necessary items in advance. During that time, I developed the "Amsterdam" clutch. Visiting one of the furniture material stores, I noticed a modest felt fabric. It was made from scraps of old fabrics mixed with technical wool. The result was a solid non-woven fabric with bright specks of fabric scraps, which added a luxurious touch to it. This material is often used in furniture as padding, between spring blocks and the base material, but it had never been used for finishing the facades of furniture items. I found it mesmerizing, and upon returning to the workshop, I immediately started creating the "Amsterdam" clutch. It became a hit right after its announcement. Orders for it were coming in so fast that it seemed like we weren't making bags at all, but exclusively focusing on this type of clutch. This development brought us a significant amount of profit, which we entirely directed towards purchasing production equipment, creating and equipping new workplaces.
At that time, I realized for myself that the most valuable things for a designer are always lying on the surface, and the strength of a designer lies in noticing beauty in everyday life and expressing it in their work. Interestingly, the fashion brand "Louis Vuitton" only applied these materials in their collection in the fall of 2020, which was a pleasant compliment to me, albeit an obvious one only to myself. I sewed this clutch for days, getting up at three in the morning, picking up Maxim Deyko, and going to the production facility together. We had to prepare the cutting by the time the day shift started at eight o'clock. It was an unforgettable time, which I miss today. A time of youthful maximalism and the desire to create. I remember how once I bought a whole roll of this fabric in a furniture store. The salesperson said with disdain that this roll would last me a lifetime. How satisfied I was when the roll of material was completely transformed into clutches and sold out in three days. And I would say to myself, "Let no one measure me by themselves!"
The moment of moving to the new premises turned out to be extremely crucial for us. Now we had a place to invite guests and clients, and it became a time of amazing encounters. One such encounter was with Maxim Deyko, the son of Mikhail Deyko, whom I mentioned earlier and from whom I once sought advice on working with leather. As it turned out later, Maxim came to us to find out the "company's secret", as the brand's name was becoming louder and more noticeable in professional circles. I had many conversations with Maxim, and I liked this guy. His kindness, openness, and integrity in communication were admirable. After a month of such interaction, the idea came to my mind to invite Maxim to join the company as a partner. He had grown up in the workshop of his parents, professional tailors, and he knew everything and even more than was required at that time.
The offer was as follows: "Join our team for a minimum wage, and if we work well together within six months, I'll transfer you a 5 percent stake in the company." Maxim took about a week to consider the offer. But for some reason, I was confident he would agree. And he did. With Maxim joining the team, we started working with even greater vigor. Production began to take on more meaningful and logical forms. Maxim's knowledge allowed us to standardize templates, streamline production processes, and relieve some of my workload. By this time, we were already making about twenty sales a day, requiring us to produce approximately 600-700 units per month.
From that moment on, we started recruiting anyone who could be useful to the brand. Our production capacity constantly lagged behind the sales capacity we were using at the time. The client base was growing at a tremendous pace. We needed everything: sales managers, call managers, seamstresses, technical specialists. By the summer of 2016, we were already in need of hiring a driver. Before that, I and Evgeny Kovalenko would drive for free lunches for all employees. We went to the school cafeteria, where lunches are cheaper than anywhere else to this day. Throughout the day, there were already a large number of insignificant but necessary trips accumulating, which could be handled by anyone willing to work as a driver for us. So, Maxim Malyshovich came to interview for the driver position.
After that, Maxim became the head of the sales department, leading a large division of almost fifty people. And a little later, by 2017, Maxim became the director of LLC "Bychkovsky". I was amazed at how unpredictably the destinies of team members unfolded within the framework of my once naive project. How specialists are nurtured, and how easily they solve tasks that were once impossible to solve. On the one hand, there was not a single specialist in the country that we needed, and on the other hand, I didn't even know the names of the professions for the vacancies we were looking for. There were no leather craftsmen, no leather seamstresses, no bag technologists, no brand managers, and no creative directors. Nobody was there, just me and people who believed in my idea sincerely and genuinely... But the absence of everything and everyone didn't scare me; it only spurred me on because I already had a whole team of like-minded people. It was a dark time, although not so distant anymore.
During this period, the volume of orders increased every day. By the summer of 2016, we were receiving about 30 orders per day. We hired anyone who showed willingness to come for an interview. However, we didn't have much time for thorough interviews. One such case, which turned out to be pivotal for the brand, was the interview with our current head of production, Olga Vladimirovna Migalevich. She appeared for the interview as a charming young woman, and after talking to her, we decided to hire her as a seamstress. She already had experience in sewing furniture, which, incidentally, was the closest match to our sewing requirements among all possible experiences. As it turned out later, Olga Vladimirovna had actually come for an interview for a sales manager position, but somehow this information slipped our attention. And fortunately so. Olga quickly grew from a seamstress to a master, and then to an experienced leader, responsibly holding her position to this day.
By October 2016, our company had grown to about sixty employees. Everything started to turn into some kind of uncontrolled process where I didn't even know the names of the people who worked for us anymore. Yevgeny Kovalenko suggested moving to Minsk and setting up an office there, as it would be much more convenient to organize meetings and negotiate strategic agreements with partners from Minsk. I deeply appreciated the work of every person involved in the brand's operations. However, remembering the names of such a large number of employees physically seemed impossible to me. In Minsk, we organized a content department with two photographers, a retail network development department, and a call center department. The retail network development department was headed by a kind guy named Yevgeny Lozovik. We also had an excellent secretary, Ekaterina Kryuchkova, with whom we later accomplished something important for the brand. But more on that later.Book design is the art of incorporating the content, style, format, design, and sequence of the various components of a book into a coherent whole. In the words of Jan Tschichold, "methods and rules upon which it is impossible to improve, have been developed over centuries. To produce perfect books, these rules have to be brought back to life and applied."
Front matter, or preliminaries, is the first section of a book and is usually the smallest section in terms of the number of pages. Each page is counted, but no folio or page number is expressed or printed, on either display pages or blank pages.
Front matter, or preliminaries, is the first section of a book and is usually the smallest section in terms of the number of pages. Each page is counted, but no folio or page number is expressed or printed, on either display pages or blank pages.
The first task we took on was opening our flagship store. It was sorely needed in Minsk, as about five hundred customers per month were residents of the capital. Our Director of Retail Network Development, Yevgeny Sergeyevich Lozovik, took on the task, and I must say he did an excellent job. There was no store in Minsk more beautiful than ours. Customers from all over the country came to visit us to admire our products in person, and there was always an honest, living queue at the entrance to the store. It was a pleasure for me to meet customers who could come even from Moscow for our original designs. Occasionally, I myself would stand behind the counter. It was my tribute to tradition, as I once stood behind the counter of my small showroom in Baranovichi. Even in those days, I continued this sacred duty, remembering my own roots and honest hard work.
In 2017, we welcomed the year with a team of around seventy people, a store in Minsk, and an office in Minsk. I devoted a lot of time to reading, aiming to read a book a day. I felt that this was my main distinguishing feature from competitors—I was not afraid of work or learning, and education greatly trained me. Inside, there was always a desire to do things differently. To differentiate our approaches in advertising and design from other designers and fashion designers. One winter day, a bright idea came to me. To hold a giveaway among our page subscribers, where the main prize would be a lifetime supply of bags. When I shared this idea with Yevgeny Kovalenko, I could see the excitement in his eyes. We began to implement this idea. Economically, it was extremely beneficial for us from a PR standpoint because our bags were indeed a valuable asset for us. However, since we produced this asset ourselves, such a prize did not impose any "difficulties" on us. And no one else could afford such a prize!
The contest created an unprecedented buzz on the internet. The numbers speak for themselves—around 80,000 participants within a month, who subscribed to our VKontakte page. In a single moment, our community became the largest in Belarus among all others. And the brand became the most popular and recognizable in the country. Now, we had a huge number of clients not only from Belarus but also from Russia. From that moment on, a new stage of glory for the BYCKOVSKI brand began, and at the same time, my head started spinning from the fame. We produced a beautiful video capturing my thoughts on this matter, showing what the brand had become thanks to the support of people who cared about my work. I started getting recognized too often, and there wasn't a single instance where people didn't approach me on the street to take a photo together.
Suddenly, but thanks to diligent work, it would have been a shame not to use the sudden fame to achieve new goals. While preparing for the opening of the second store in Minsk, a new interesting idea popped into my head. I decided to send a letter to all the media outlets in Belarus offering them an interview. However, I approached the task unconventionally. Instead of sending electronic emails, which would likely get lost among hundreds of others, I decided to send handwritten letters, signed with my signature, in non-standard colors and sizes of envelopes. I wanted them to stand out in any stack of mail, anywhere, and to make the reader more inclined to start reading from my message. I knew that handwritten letters were already rare, and that I was already in the spotlight. My secretary, Ekaterina, diligently copied the letters for the media and handed them to me for signature. As a result, in 2017, I gave over a hundred different interviews on TV, internet media, newspapers, and radio.
The sales volume exceeded a hundred bags per day, and the number of employees grew to over a hundred and ten. At the same time, our Instagram account was actively growing, reaching seventy thousand followers, and the total number of followers across all social media platforms exceeded two hundred thousand people. In the spring, we managed to open our second store in Minsk at the "Outleto" shopping center. The media generously showered our brand with compliments, and the number of customers from Minsk grew even larger. Margarita Bychkovskaya always handled the technical work of our stores. She trained employees and ensured the proper functioning of the entire offline retail system. By the way, one of our saleswomen, whom Rita trained, later became the wife of my partner, Zhenya Kovalenko. This was not an isolated case of the brand bringing people together. There is another story of two managers meeting at work in the office and living in a happy marriage to this day.
By spring 2017, we invited Mikhail Borisovich Degtyarev to join our team. He was an experienced manager of factories and large enterprises in Russia's Jewish Autonomous Region. And as it turned out later - an experienced raider who, for his craft, even spent time in prison. And this became clear when he managed to deeply implement his plans for seizing our brainchild. In just a few months of his stay on our team, he managed to appropriate a corporate card, purchase an SUV for company funds, transfer the domain name byckovski.by and the trademark BYCKOVSKI to another legal entity, as well as take home a television and start misusing employees' resources for unrelated projects. All this time, I and Zhenya Kovalenko were in Minsk, and he, persuading the team, convinced everyone that I was the main villain. Not the founder, not the designer, not the originator, but the villain.
For me, this was one of the hardest blows on my straightforward path. It never crossed my mind that your "child," which you nurtured from conception, could at some point become not yours — through the simple manipulations of experienced predators. During those days, Alena Fedorovna reached out to me. She's now our lawyer. And she simply shared the scheme that was happening at our enterprise right now. To me, a twenty-three-year-old lad, it was beyond my comprehension, and why would it be? I grew up in a simple family, and such situations don't happen in simple families. I had to come up with some kind of counter scheme urgently, and armed with various lawyers, I was able to devise it. Degtyarev came up with a legend that we had serious violations in tax reporting, which frightened key people in the team. Under the hypothetical threat of imprisonment with debts, they started listening to him attentively, and information no longer reached me.
It never crossed my mind that your "child," which you nurtured from conception, could at some point become not yours — through the simple manipulations of experienced predators.
For me, this was one of the toughest blows on my straightforward path.
During those days, Alena Fedorovna reached out to me. She's now our lawyer. And she simply shared the scheme that was happening at our enterprise right now. To me, a twenty-three-year-old lad, it was beyond my comprehension, and why would it be?
I grew up in a simple family, and such situations don't happen in simple families. I had to come up with some kind of counter scheme urgently, and armed with various lawyers, I was able to devise it. Degtyarev came up with a legend that we had serious violations in tax reporting, which frightened key people in the team. Under the hypothetical threat of imprisonment with debts, they started listening to him attentively, and information no longer reached me.
The problem for me was that he was trying to push out all of my allies from the company under the guise of their incompetence, but at the same time, I didn't know who I could trust. Neither partners nor employees. It was a puzzle that I had to solve alone. His task, on the other hand, was to quickly remove all assets from the enterprise and bankrupt it, take over my team, and buy out the brand and factory for debts. To a large extent, I believed his tales.
I believed in violations, in shortcomings that, if they existed at all, were without our selfish intent. But my lawyers managed to convince me that all of this was baseless blackmail. In those days, more than ever, I understood the meaning of the expression, "Fear has big eyes." It was terrifying to the point of trembling. Terrifying to lose everything and terrifying to get involved in a complex story with such a shark. One day, he invited me for a talk. It was like something out of a gangster movie.
I already had an action plan, but I considered it important to attend this meeting. It took place in a kitchen with a Soviet interior. I sat down on the corner sofa, while he stood opposite, leaning against the kitchen cabinets. It was very smoky, and there was an unpleasant smell. He told me that I had to transfer shares to certain people, that I had betrayed everyone, and that only he could solve all our problems. I nodded and agreed with everything.
Apparently, he expected some element of surprise. He thought I would be scared. In turn, I played along with his expectations and nodded. We shook hands. I returned to Minsk, and that same night, I went back to Baranovichi. I first met with our HR manager and then immediately with the director, so I could dismiss him and take over as director at night. Gathering all the key people in the team, I explained what trick was being played and what needed to be done next.
The next morning, he came to continue his plan, and of course, it was a surprise for him to see my car. When he entered the office, I immediately told him that we no longer needed his services. To which he pointed out that he wouldn't talk to me and would only talk to the director. I introduced myself: "Nice to meet you, Zhenya Bychkovsky - director." He was furious.
He even decided not to take his salary, but an hour later, he started texting us, saying that he was at the doors of the investigative committee, and that if I didn't come to talk to him right now, we would have big problems. In turn, I took my team with me and went to the office of the Department of Financial Investigations, where I confessed to the foolishness that Degtyarev had imposed on us. The employees just smiled, listened to me, and at the end, patting me on the shoulder, they suggested returning to the office and just continuing our wonderful work.
I grew up in a simple family, and such situations don't happen in simple families. I had to come up with some kind of counter scheme urgently, and armed with various lawyers, I was able to devise it. Degtyarev came up with a legend that we had serious violations in tax reporting, which frightened key people in the team. Under the hypothetical threat of imprisonment with debts, they started listening to him attentively, and information no longer reached me.
The problem for me was that he was trying to push out all of my allies from the company under the guise of their incompetence, but at the same time, I didn't know who I could trust. Neither partners nor employees. It was a puzzle that I had to solve alone. His task, on the other hand, was to quickly remove all assets from the enterprise and bankrupt it, take over my team, and buy out the brand and factory for debts. To a large extent, I believed his tales.
I believed in violations, in shortcomings that, if they existed at all, were without our selfish intent. But my lawyers managed to convince me that all of this was baseless blackmail. In those days, more than ever, I understood the meaning of the expression, "Fear has big eyes." It was terrifying to the point of trembling. Terrifying to lose everything and terrifying to get involved in a complex story with such a shark. One day, he invited me for a talk. It was like something out of a gangster movie.
I already had an action plan, but I considered it important to attend this meeting. It took place in a kitchen with a Soviet interior. I sat down on the corner sofa, while he stood opposite, leaning against the kitchen cabinets. It was very smoky, and there was an unpleasant smell. He told me that I had to transfer shares to certain people, that I had betrayed everyone, and that only he could solve all our problems. I nodded and agreed with everything.
Apparently, he expected some element of surprise. He thought I would be scared. In turn, I played along with his expectations and nodded. We shook hands. I returned to Minsk, and that same night, I went back to Baranovichi. I first met with our HR manager and then immediately with the director, so I could dismiss him and take over as director at night. Gathering all the key people in the team, I explained what trick was being played and what needed to be done next.
The next morning, he came to continue his plan, and of course, it was a surprise for him to see my car. When he entered the office, I immediately told him that we no longer needed his services. To which he pointed out that he wouldn't talk to me and would only talk to the director. I introduced myself: "Nice to meet you, Zhenya Bychkovsky - director." He was furious.
He even decided not to take his salary, but an hour later, he started texting us, saying that he was at the doors of the investigative committee, and that if I didn't come to talk to him right now, we would have big problems. In turn, I took my team with me and went to the office of the Department of Financial Investigations, where I confessed to the foolishness that Degtyarev had imposed on us. The employees just smiled, listened to me, and at the end, patting me on the shoulder, they suggested returning to the office and just continuing our wonderful work.
That's how, slightly battered, we drove this shark out of our lagoon, filling the gaps in knowledge about enterprise management. Together with such difficulties, by the end of 2017, both I and the BYCKOVSKI brand managed to enter some prestigious rankings in our country. For example, the "TOP-30 Belarusian Entrepreneurs Under 30" ranking, where I took a respectable tenth place. Nominated for Entrepreneur of the Year by the international auditing company ERNST and YOUNG. And also entered the third position among the most popular Belarusians in the Yandex search engine (Gusarov group). It seemed that no difficulty could not be overcome, as if I had grabbed God by the beard. The company's performance was growing, subscribers in all social networks were growing, recognition was growing. In the summer of 2017, I decided to return to Baranovichi to continue direct management of the enterprise, while Zhenya Kovalenko remained in Minsk.
Upon returning home, I embarked on the next vector of brand development - the creation of the BYCKOVSKI WEAR division, and it was also time to open a new store in Baranovichi. After all, I had sold the old showroom to a girl whose name I no longer remember. Revenue from online sales was much more profitable and carefree, but it was important for me to have a sacred place in my hometown. The development of the clothing collection was entrusted to the designer Leyla Mirzvoyeva, the owner of the NOWWON brand. By autumn, she was already ready, and the announcement was made. The public warmly embraced our new direction with great excitement, and it seemed in those days that we had only one path - forward. In Baranovichi, I managed to find a beautiful location at Lenin Square, Building 1. Work on it continued until November 2017. The store was filled with plenty of greenery and beautiful items. There, for two years, I conducted live broadcasts with my employees, which were attended by a record number of people, but more on that later.
About the opening of the store in Baranovichi on November 18, 2017, I wrote in my blog like this:
"I'm very nervous... Tomorrow at 10:00 I'm opening a store for my products in my hometown of Baranovichi. It's a big event for me because this land and place gave me the opportunity and inspiration to become a designer... When I was 20, I opened my first BYCKOVSKI store, with a bunch (as it seemed to me then) of borrowed money... Because I couldn't repay the money on time, I let down a friend and lost him in the same moment. Many people, including my parents, said: 'Why are you opening? It's going to fail!' But I knew that either I would do my thing or live an ordinary life! The debt was repaid, my fellow countrymen supported me that year, and the store allowed me to continue developing... I was happy. But one thing I knew - a tiny store of 5 square meters is not the best way to show gratitude to my hometown... Friends, anyone who is willing, who is happy for me, come tomorrow from 10:00 to 22:00 to the "BYCKOVSKI 2.0" store in Baranovichi (Lenin Square, Building 1), to pat me on the back and encourage me for new achievements. I'll be happy to thank everyone for their support, give a tight hug, and maybe even shed a tear remembering how much we've been through together..."
"I'm very nervous... Tomorrow at 10:00 I'm opening a store for my products in my hometown of Baranovichi. It's a big event for me because this land and place gave me the opportunity and inspiration to become a designer... When I was 20, I opened my first BYCKOVSKI store, with a bunch (as it seemed to me then) of borrowed money... Because I couldn't repay the money on time, I let down a friend and lost him in the same moment. Many people, including my parents, said: 'Why are you opening? It's going to fail!' But I knew that either I would do my thing or live an ordinary life! The debt was repaid, my fellow countrymen supported me that year, and the store allowed me to continue developing... I was happy. But one thing I knew - a tiny store of 5 square meters is not the best way to show gratitude to my hometown... Friends, anyone who is willing, who is happy for me, come tomorrow from 10:00 to 22:00 to the "BYCKOVSKI 2.0" store in Baranovichi (Lenin Square, Building 1), to pat me on the back and encourage me for new achievements. I'll be happy to thank everyone for their support, give a tight hug, and maybe even shed a tear remembering how much we've been through together..."
The opening of the store drew a large crowd. People brought gifts, took photos, and congratulated me. It was heartening to receive well-wishes and kind words from so many supportive individuals. Yet, I sincerely couldn't help but wonder if I truly deserved all this attention and encouragement. Perhaps, that day marked the last instance of genuine joy for me, as dark times awaited the fate of the brand.
My partner, Zhenya Kovalenko, departed from the project. It was my suggestion, as I gathered from our conversations that he had lost interest in the brand. The year 2018 began, and the first six months seemed calm and according to plan. I continued to work on clothing designs and expand the brand's line of bags. The company had a small loan, around $30,000, which I used to buy out Zhenya's share. There were no signs of trouble, but it struck unexpectedly. We lost access to our Instagram account due to a Facebook system error. At that time, we already had 116,000 followers.
My partner, Zhenya Kovalenko, departed from the project. It was my suggestion, as I gathered from our conversations that he had lost interest in the brand. The year 2018 began, and the first six months seemed calm and according to plan. I continued to work on clothing designs and expand the brand's line of bags. The company had a small loan, around $30,000, which I used to buy out Zhenya's share. There were no signs of trouble, but it struck unexpectedly. We lost access to our Instagram account due to a Facebook system error. At that time, we already had 116,000 followers.
Essentially, it was the sole instrument creating a cash flow for the functioning of the enterprise.
The account generated anywhere from $50,000 to $100,000 for us monthly.
Of course, this event triggered a crisis at our factory. It was incredibly challenging to attract old followers to the new account, and we didn't have enough funds for it. Our obligations far exceeded our expenses. The queue of customers awaiting their orders grew larger every day. In an attempt to keep the enterprise afloat, we were forced to take payments from "current customers" to fulfill orders made two or three months ago. I was scared. I couldn't show this to the team, but I understood everything... Suppliers, with each passing day, were less willing to deliver goods to us. Debts to suppliers were also increasing. The enormous staff, which was already excessive for the volume of orders we had after losing the account, exacerbated the situation even further.
To reduce the staff, money was also required for severance payments to employees. We found ourselves in a very difficult position, which I would call a "double bind": a situation in which any move by the player leads to a worsening of their position. And if I were alone, I definitely wouldn't have been able to handle all of this. My partner Maxim Deyko and director Maxim Malyshyevich took on the full weight of the problem. We were also forced to minimize the marketing budget; there simply weren't any funds available for it. Delays in salary payments initiated a process of disintegration within the team itself. To be fair, I must note that the delays were never prolonged. They lasted no more than a week, but unfortunately, they became regular from month to month. Unfortunately, little by little, we started losing the team, the very ones we so desperately needed in those days.
Book design is the art of incorporating the content, style, format, design, and sequence of the various components of a book into a coherent whole. In the words of Jan Tschichold, "methods and rules upon which it is impossible to improve, have been developed over centuries. To produce perfect books, these rules have to be brought back to life and applied."
Front matter, or preliminaries, is the first section of a book and is usually the smallest section in terms of the number of pages. Each page is counted, but no folio or page number is expressed or printed, on either display pages or blank pages.
Book design is the art of incorporating the content, style, format, design, and sequence of the various components of a book into a coherent whole. In the words of Jan Tschichold, "methods and rules upon which it is impossible to improve, have been developed over centuries. To produce perfect books, these rules have to be brought back to life and applied."
Front matter, or preliminaries, is the first section of a book and is usually the smallest section in terms of the number of pages. Each page is counted, but no folio or page number is expressed or printed, on either display pages or blank pages.
My self-esteem began to crumble. I felt like I was losing control of the situation in those days. For the first time in six years of working on the project, I didn't know what, and most importantly, how, to do things correctly. I knew for sure that I couldn't let down our customers. I knew for sure that I couldn't let our creation drown in debt because of a mistake for which we weren't even responsible. Yet, we had no choice but to try to fight. My fame played a cruel joke on me. Because of my interviews, an unprecedented number of bag designers emerged in the country, believing that they could achieve success like mine. When I started sewing, there were thirteen bag designers in the country, including me, but by the time of our crisis, there were
We couldn't compete in the fashion market, not even compared to a simple tent at the market. Orders from China were arriving twice as fast as we could produce them. During that period, I recalled a meeting with a guy whose name, unfortunately, I no longer remember. He told me about his success in selling flowers through live streams on Instagram. It seemed to me that this could also be effective for us during this difficult time. So, we equipped a studio in the store in Baranovichi and got to work. The live streams involved casual conversations with the audience, always with two hosts simultaneously. In between, I would pull out a bag from under the table and offer it to subscribers through an auction method, encouraging them to call in and purchase the products. The live streams took place twice a week, and this helped us sell an additional five hundred bags per month. While the situation was still challenging, it began to look more manageable.
But a month later, we faced a new disaster. A criminal case was opened against me based on a report from my former employee. He had worked with us for a short time before fleeing, taking part of the team with him to start his own bag brand with a very similar brand story and very similar bags. To say that I was angry would be an understatement about my feelings. I couldn't comprehend the audacity of this scoundrel and his competitive methods. During those days, I asked myself: "Is this what you wanted to achieve in design? Problems and disputes? Is this what you dreamed of on your path?" With complaints about fate, I turned to my friend, the banker. On that day, he gave me one piece of advice that I will remember for the rest of my life — "Zhenya, you know how to deliver a good blow; your enterprise proves that. But you must also learn to take a hit, and your enterprise must demonstrate that."
This advice shaped my renewed philosophy of how to perceive what could happen in my life. After all, I entered a phase of new, adult difficulties back then. But these changes and transformations took years. The essence of the accusation boiled down to the fact that at the beginning of my journey, I was registered as a craftsman, paid the corresponding taxes for it, and after clarifying in a tax consultation whether I could make bags as a craftsman, I received an unequivocal answer, "Yes, you can." I also had the right to recruit apprentices into my team, teaching them so they could help me. I was accused of owing a large sum, around half a million dollars. Fortunately, the Minister of Finance of Belarus intervened on my behalf, confirming my right, as a craftsman, to make bags in a letter. However, unfortunately, about three thousand of my clients were questioned during the investigation, further damaging my reputation in front of them. Fashion is a public sphere of activity, and everything in it must be perfect. Such rumors buried us.
All that we had built over the years had to be shut down in order to save the company in some form. We had to close both stores in Minsk, redirecting the funds that were spent on rent and employee salaries there towards marketing and paying off debts. Due to the rapid loss of interest in the brand, two partner stores in Brest and Grodno also closed. The staff, which numbered 120 people, was reduced to sixty. We were like a boat, riddled with holes, through which water was pouring in at a tremendous speed. The clothing project also had to be shut down, as it still required financial injections for development. I didn't want to believe that this was the end, the end of the brand's story. One Sunday, I woke up, put on a suit, drove to the production facility, filled the entire car with my bags, bought a canister of gasoline, went to the quarry, and dumped all the products into a pile, set it on fire, and watched with my own eyes as everything I had built burned down... I had no chance of getting out of the crisis. It was the end. For some reason, I wanted to do this performance for myself, and looking at the burning fire, I realized that it was a pathetic spectacle, and that I wouldn't allow myself to lose hope out of pity for myself. I would either fight or wait for the end. These were my thoughts - full of pessimism. But my team had much more optimistic views on what was happening, and surely only their faith and efforts could keep the enterprise going in that difficult moment.
At the end of October, I decided to go to a restaurant to distract myself. By nature, I'm not a fan of public places; they always feel fraught with danger to me. I don't like being stared at, especially knowing that my presence is the topic of discussion in any public setting. There, a guy approached me and offered to work with my brand in Poland. Maybe this is the saving grace I've been looking for? Maybe it's worth taking the risk and giving it a try? I agreed. Especially since I had been there before, more than once. I was enamored with the Eastern European architecture, with its traditions of sewing that had been preserved in some form, with those small family workshops that had been operating for generations. I needed to reboot myself, and my soul needed creative solitude. My despondency certainly wasn't helping the optimism of our team. And Warsaw was the closest example of Eastern European fashion, albeit overly influenced by references to Paris and Milan.
While I remember this time with a special warmth from those acquaintances and encounters, it didn't really help me in any significant way.
Altogether, I spent about a year in Warsaw.
Problems would occasionally arise at the office, and even though I wasn't involved in the business and lived off what I could earn for myself, some employees would call me with accusations and demands to urgently pay their wages. Those conversations always put me in a bad mood for a long time. I didn't pay myself any salary or dividends for over a year, and there was nothing to take anyway, considering the overall situation, it would only complicate our situation further. It's important to note that my partner, Maxim Deyko, also refused dividends and lived on a very small salary for about three years. For me, this was a significant demonstration of his commitment and love for the project, especially during a period when many others 'dropped out' due to financial difficulties at the company.