If you've shopped with us at Boerne Market Days in Boerne, Texas, or found us here at elam-co.com, you've probably noticed the name Kialiyah on everything we make. I get asked about it more than almost anything else at our booth — where does that name come from? Is it a place? A word in another language? We get "is it Hawaiian?" more than you'd think, and every time it makes us smile.
Nothing so complicated. It's our granddaughters.
We have three grandchildren who are the whole reason this business exists in the first place. We're San Antonio, Texas through and through, and Ezra is our oldest, almost 9 now — a creative, artistic kid who's just as happy drawing or building something as he is out on the basketball court or in the pool with his friends. And then there are our two girls, Kiara and Aliyah, who will both turn 4 within a month of each other this coming January and February. If you ask us to describe them, we usually say it this way: Kiara is spicy, and Aliyah is sweet. Kiara's the spirited one, quick with her own opinion and never shy about it. Aliyah is gentle, easygoing, the kind of sweet that makes a room softer. Two little girls who couldn't be more different and couldn't be more perfect together.
When I was trying to come up with a name for this line of bags, I wanted something that felt like *us*, not something borrowed from a catalog of pretty-sounding words. So I took a little of Kiara's name and a little of Aliyah's name, put them together, and Kialiyah was born. Every bag that carries that name is, in a small way, carrying them too.
Once I had the name, the rest of the design started falling into place almost on its own.
The wildflowers on our logo aren't just pretty — they're Kiara and Aliyah.
Every spring, the drive from San Antonio out to see the kids — whether we're headed to Elmendorf or Floresville, or even further out on a day trip to Garner State Park, South Llano River, Guadalupe River State Park, or down to Port Aransas — fills up with bluebonnets and Indian paintbrush along the roadside. It's just a Texas thing. You can't make that drive in March or April without seeing them everywhere. It's no accident San Antonio's biggest spring celebration, Fiesta, centers on flowers too — it's just in the water down here this time of year. So when it came time to design a logo, those were the flowers that made sense. So that's what you'll find in our logo: a bluebonnet and an Indian paintbrush, standing in for our two granddaughters. It felt fitting, especially once we thought about it — the bluebonnet is soft, calm, that gentle Texas blue everybody loves. The Indian paintbrush is bold, fiery red-orange, impossible to miss in a field. Sweet and spicy, growing side by side. We didn't plan that part. It just turned out to be exactly right.
And the three dragonflies? That's all of them.
Look closely at the Elam & Co. logo and you'll spot three small dragonflies — one for Ezra, one for Kiara, one for Aliyah, all three grandbabies together. We chose dragonflies on purpose, not just because they're pretty. In a lot of traditions, dragonflies symbolize transformation, wisdom, and adaptability — a creature that starts its life one way entirely underwater, then transforms completely into something that moves through air and light. In many Asian cultures, they also represent courage and prosperity. All of that felt like exactly what we want for these three kids as they grow — the courage to become whoever they're meant to be, the wisdom to adapt along the way, and a little prosperity and joy carried with them the whole time.
Why this matters more than just a good backstory
Honestly, we didn't set out to build a "brand story." We set out to make something beautiful with our hands, the same way quilts have been made in families for generations — passed down, worked on in the evenings, made with whoever you love most in mind. It just so happens that the people we love most are three grandchildren who don't even know yet that their names are stitched into everything we sell.
So when you carry a [Kialiyah tote](https://elam-co.com/collections/tote-bags), or tuck a book into one of our [quilted covers](https://elam-co.com/collections/misc-pos), you're not just carrying a bag. You're carrying a little piece of our family — a spicy girl, a sweet girl, and a creative big brother, watching over every stitch.
We hope that means something to you the way it means everything to us.
— Chris & Patricia Elam