After 17 years as a professional stage manager—including stints on Broadway—Jennifer Kahn had seen her share of shows. But she’d also seen something else: just how much gets thrown away after the last curtain goes down. She started asking industry friends for their old scraps of fabric to palettes of scenery from warehouse cleanouts, and used these items to design clutches, totes, and jewelry. In 2017 she officially launched her line of repurposed accessories, Scenery Bags, from her then-home in New York. Three years after starting her business and moving across the country to Houston, she has saved nearly 25,000 pounds of items headed for the dump. A portion of every sale goes to benefit the Theatre Development Fund, a nonprofit that expands access to performing arts for all.
