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For Monica Phromsavanh, CEO and founder of Modabox, the reception of immigrants and refugees is an issue that hits close to home--literally.
She was born and raised in a Laotian refugee camp in Argentina, surviving a childhood of hunger and hardship.

There's a lot that's been done by and for women and girls, but there's still plenty to do. Convened by the White House, this Summit will rally all of us together to celebrate what we've achieved, and how we're going to take action moving forward. Covering key gender equality issues, we'll make a powerful difference in our collective future.

For Monica Phromsavanh, bootstrapping as an entrepreneur doesn’t seem like a major sacrifice, considering the potential upside of her business. After all, her life in New York City as Founder and CEO of Modabox is a long way from Misiones, the small town in northern Argentina where her Laotian family lived as refugees after fleeing the chaos and violence of the secret war that overtook much of Southeast Asia.

In 2006, Monica Phromsavanh moved to New York with 200 dollars in her pocket, a suitcase stuffed with her belongings, and a dream to make it on her own. “I used 73 dollars to buy a Metro card," said Phromsavanh. "I used the rest to eat Dollar Menu every day.” Yet within years of setting foot in the city, she'd found her niche, built a business from scratch, and generated $3 million in revenue by its third year....

No stranger to entrepreneurship himself, Simmons also teamed up with ModaBox, a fashion subscription service for women, to round out his fashion show's offerings. Noting he's always "put women's looks in his shows," Simmons says he "got to know and appreciate" ModaBox's edgy aesthetic, and found it gelled nicely with his urban classics like slim-cut khaki pants and colorful cable knit sweaters...

When thinking about the bootstrapping success stories of the self-made American Dreamers, Monica Phromsavanh is definitely one of them. Founder and CEO of ModaBox -- a retail concept that combines personal styling with e-commerce -- Phromsavanh started before she even arrived in the United States.

A simple, innovative idea combined with fierce determination. The result? ModaBox. ModaBox, a new fashion concept store and website launched in September 2014, was founded by Monica Phromsavanh who is now one of our new favorite people. And we know you'll agree.

“I've done everything from cleaning apartments to wrapping chocolates,” she says. She arrived in the city eight years ago with two hundred dollars in her pocket—that, and a lot of ambition. After working with clothing stores like Express and Burberry, Phromsavanh founded Modalistas, but she wanted to do more. That's how she came up with the idea of ModaBox, which puts personalized styles into the hands of women around the country.

Our stylists have years of professional experience styling high profile, as well as every day clientele. We've created a service that will make our clients lives easier by providing exceptional personal attention to each and every one of them. For months our team worked on a comprehensive quiz that assesses style, size, and budget preferences so that we could tailor each box to our clients' particular lifestyle.

In this episode of Maker's Lane, ModaBox Founder + CEO, Monica Phromsavanh, talks about growing up in a refugee camp in Argentina, working her way up through retail in America and taking the risk to build her own dream. Get inspired by Monica's non-stop hustle and catch her honest advice for aspiring entrepreneurs.

Our favorite fashion tech startups are the ones that combine technology with a human touch. ModaBox does just that–this new company delivers customized outfits created by stylists to shopper's homes. Recently we spoke with the co-founder of ModaBox, Leona Vasserman, to find out more.

Modabox, a fashion forward women's apparel retailer focused on personal styling, with a storefront in the Seaport District is mainly based online; the service allows you to take a fun style quiz and be paired with your very own personal stylist to help you the latest apparel and accessories to enhance your wardrobe.