“For as long as I can remember, working with my hands and expressing my creativity has a part of my daily life. Growing up in a large extended family,  I was always sewing or painting or crafting with my cousins and aunts.  My first memories are of my Grandma walking me around her rose garden, and admiring her magnificent crystal collection that completely captivated me – the light shining into the glass display case created rainbows across the room.  Perhaps my love of design was inherited from my Grandpa, who was an inventor and Industrial Designer with a great appreciation for finely constructed furniture and machinery.”‘I created my first piece of jewellery aged 4 – a shell necklace made with treasured finds from a summer holiday by the sea. Many years later I created a necklace using shells from a broken vintage shell lei that my great-aunt had bought me back from a holiday in Tahiti. This shell flower necklace went on be the signature piece of my brand “Mamo Jo” (Caribbean for Mermaid).’

Mamo Jo grew to a global business that supplied 240 retail stores (including Quicksilver Europe) and a flagship Bondi store and another in The Rocks, Sydney.

On one of Lisa's annual business visits to the Quicksilver Europe head office in Biarritz, France, the 'Lisa Carney Design" label was born. The chic stylish seaside town ignited her creative soul and, much like her muse Coco Chanel who would holiday there before she started her brand Chanel, she designed a stylistic, sophisticated inaugural collection that attracted the attention of the prestigious department store “Au Printemp” in Paris and was selected to be sold on the tableau deluxe (luxury table).