Vera Bradley’s Tournament of Roses fashion float

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Vera Bradley, creator of the soft-sided, floral-printed fabric handbags favored by suburban moms the world over, will have a float in the Rose Parade on Thursday. The brand’s “Hope Grows” float is No. 17 in the lineup. It’s an accessories garden of sorts that’s also intended to represent hope for a future free of breast cancer. Cynthia Nixon of “Sex and the City” fame will be one of four breast cancer survivors riding on the float. (The Vera Bradley Foundation for Breast Cancer, created in 1998 after company founders Barbara Bradley Baekgaard and Patricia Miller lost a friend to the disease, has donated $10 million for research at the Indiana University Simon Cancer Center.)

Bradley will also introduce a special collection to coincide with the parade, including three purses and a travel bag. See verabradley.com for details.

-- Booth Moore

Image: Artist rendering of float. Credit: Vera Bradley