Sabrina Thompson

beanpYe Chief Executive Officer and Designer

Since the age of 11, Sabrina has been piecing together unconventional clothing. As a fledgling track star, Sabrina was inspired by her childhood heroine, the late Olympic gold medalist Florence Griffith-Joyner. “Flo Jo was the flyest, most confident women I had ever seen that dared to be different when it came to fashion,” says the beanpYe visionary.

In 1988, Flo Jo was wearing glitzy outfits while she set world records at the Olympics in Seoul, Korea. At the same time, Sabrina was discovering her own fashion identity and setting records at the National Junior Olympics in Florida.  Dressed Flo-Jo style in a one-legged purple unitard, a gold tank top, and the longest press-on nails she could find, Sabrina won her first national championship. “I look back on it now and it’s hilarious,” she remembers with a burst of laughter. “But that’s when I realized it’s okay to wear something funky!” 

The next year, Sabrina started pairing stripes with polka dots and anything else that conventionally was not “supposed” to go together. Instead of throwing old clothing away, she would revamp dated fashions into new, original styles that others gradually began to appreciate.  It didn’t dawn on her to make money from her creations until she tricked out a few pairs of flip flops and sold them to sorority girls to make extra money in college at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

After graduating from UNC in 2001, Sabrina moved to New York City and continued to create her unique apparel by personally hand painting and/or embellishing each creation. She credits her drive to construct each new garment or decorative ornament from her experiences growing up in the small town of Wilson, North Carolina, her fast-paced life in New York City, as well as varying genres of art, music and media. With the help of Sundree, a Brooklyn based branding company, Sabrina launched beanpYe in April of 2005.

Aside from fashion, Sabrina has been a highly accomplished athlete in the world of track and field, winning several national championships and over ten individual high school championships. She became an All-American sprinter and earned full scholarships to Louisiana State University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where she earned a B.A. in Communications.  She used her degree to become a television producer for various companies and networks such as Columbia Tri-Star Television, Sony Pictures TV, and Court TV News. Sabrina recently resigned from the world of TV to become a high school public speaking & debate teacher in Brooklyn. “At this point in my life helping youth thrive and reach their potential in life and fashion keeps my creative juices flowing. I decided to make a change and I haven't looked back!”

In her spare time she is an executive officer and board member of WEEN (Women in Entertainment Empowerment Network), a new non profit organization and subsidiary of Russell Simmons' Hip-Hop Summit Action Network. In addition, she is also a media consultant for the National Bar Association and an active member in her local church.