What's In My Portfolio: Joanna Lau

WHAT'S IN MY PORTFOLIOWhat's In My Portfolio: Joanna Lau
Photos courtesy of JEMMA                            
28 Oct 2026
                        
Joanna Lau is the Founder, Designer, and CEO of JEMMA                        
                                            

“I started JEMMA in New York in my twenties, while working in finance and trying to find a bag that could carry my laptop without actually looking like a laptop bag. I couldn't find one, so eventually I left finance and started designing.

What's funny is that as my life changed, JEMMA changed with me. I went from working in an office, to building a company, travelling constantly, and eventually becoming a mother of twin boys. Apparently, I've been designing for future versions of myself without realising it. I'm still very hands-on, obsessing over whether a compartment is two centimetres too narrow, how a strap sits over a coat, or whether a bag can go from a meeting to dinner without looking out of place. I'm not designing for an imaginary woman. I'm designing for a life I recognise.

There are the obvious milestones – selling out, millions of views online, and seeing JEMMA carried by women around the world. But the thing that still gets me is spotting a stranger carrying one. I'll see an EMMA Bag across an airport or on the streets of New York and have this slightly ridiculous urge to run over and say, “That's my bag!” I usually resist. I love knowing that something that once existed only as a sketch is now going into job interviews, boardrooms, business-school classrooms, flights across the world, and first days back at work after having a baby.

I'm also proud that we've built JEMMA independently. There was no giant company or enormous budget behind us. We kept making the product better, listening to our customers, surviving the difficult years, and showing up again the next morning. A decade later, we're still here and I'm more ambitious about JEMMA than ever.

I think people will sit up when they realise the work bag deserves to be a category of its own. For years, women have been improvising – putting laptops into handbags that weren't designed for them, carrying a second tote because nothing fits, or settling for something practical they don't particularly love. I want JEMMA to change that.

We're expanding internationally, growing our presence in Asia, and working on new products and partnerships. Bringing JEMMA to Singapore has been particularly full-circle: I grew up here, built the brand in New York, and now I'm bringing that chapter of my life home.

I don't want JEMMA to simply be another handbag brand. I want a woman to think, “I need a great work bag,” and instinctively think of JEMMA. Maybe that's an ambitious thing to say out loud. But I've learnt that the things you're slightly afraid to say out loud are usually the ones worth going after.”

PEOPLE

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