Patty Carlos, owner of Di Angela Leather Goods & Accessories (140 Main St., Greenport) didn’t want to work in the family leather business. But a continent away and multiple decades under her well-worn (but ever fashionable) belt, that’s just what she did.
“I wanted to do my own thing,” says Patty. “But I ended up doing it, and I’m not sorry about that.”
After nearly 40 years of running one of Greenport’s oldest continually operated stores at the intersection of Front and Main streets — the literal cornerstone leather business in town — Carlos will be shuttering at the end of this year.
Popular with locals and tourists alike, the store beckoned accessorizing shoppers with Carlos’s selection of leather purses, work bags, wallets, shoes, jackets and hats, as well as a selection of women’s and men’s clothing and jewelry.
But it wasn’t in her original plans when, back in 1982, she immigrated to the United States from Columbia.
Carlos planned to spend one semester at Stony Brook University, learning English, while staying with family in Coram. One semester turned into her entire college education and she graduated from Stony Brook with a degree in psychology and multiple years of collegiate volleyball in the bag.
Her parents needed help with their leather production business, Corzo, and in 1988 Carlos opened a wholesale operation in the United States, selling their products without a physical location.
Carlos, who has gone by her middle name Patricia for years, put an Italian twist on her first name, Angela, when naming the U.S. venture, and Di Angela leather was born.
“During that time, Italian leather sounded good, even though we’re not Italian,” says Patty, noting the popularity of leather jackets and other well-made goods of this ilk in the ’80s and ’90s.
She quickly realized that it was more lucrative to sell directly to customers, rather than continuing with wholesale, and rented storefronts in Southold and various locations in Greenport, renovating and enhancing each one.
All of her properties operated seasonally, but Carlos began to see the year-round potential in Greenport and decoded to expand to a full calendar year.
When the opportunity arose to purchase the corner property at 140 Main Street in Greenport in 1998, Carlos and her husband jumped, selling their house in Southold and moving into the apartment conveniently located above the shop.
The building formerly housed a hardware store, so Carlos ran that business for a year until she liquidated its stock, and then brought in her own Di Angela inventory. She continued selling Columbian leather, but added new products like belts, clothing and shoes from brands around the globe.
When she started thinking about retiring, Carlos had considered selling the store but opted to look for new renters instead, which she’s now in the process of doing.
“Nobody can really run it like she ran it,” says Mark, Patty’s husband. “We want something that’ll complement the village and not be another duplicate.”
In her nearly four decades in business, Carlos’s favorite aspects have been seeing the area evolve and connecting with the locals.
“Now that I’m, closing, hearing all the comments from the customers, it’s been very touching,” she says.
Carlos still plans to keep her home base in town, right above the shop, but now she’s excited to have time for traveling, playing plenty of tennis and writing down her life story for her and Mark’s four children.
“I told my customers,” Carlos says with a smile, “I can go walking with them now.”
