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How athlete and entrepreneur Sarah Weihman started Paradis Sport, a company that makes active underwear for women, by women
Back in fourth grade, Sarah Weihman was expected to run a mile in gym class every single day. Some might hear this and think it’s an almost cruel or, at the very least, bizarre expectation for kids that young. But Weihman loved it. Despite how young she was, she found something in running that moved her.
It was at this age that her passion for sports was ignited. She grew up at a boarding school and played every sport available to her—squash, tennis, track, ice hockey—all of them. Her growing passion for sports was supported and enhanced by her parents, both athletes and sports enthusiasts themselves.
“My mom was No. 1 in New England juniors tennis (18 and under) but she graduated from Boston University in 1971 before the passage of Title IX in 1972,” Weihman said. “She would have been a great college player. She is a fierce competitor, and I try to channel her focus whenever I need it.”
Weihman played field hockey and lacrosse at Dartmouth College and graduated in 1997. Her love for outdoor sports grew exponentially while she was there—running, hiking and skiing have been a big part of her life ever since.
In 2003, Weihman went to the University of Virginia for grad school, where she earned masters degrees in architecture and landscape architecture. After graduating, she dove head first into architecture, eventually starting her own firm in Newport, Rhode Island in 2006. While she loved her job, she spent long hours at a desk and, after 20 years or so, found herself itching to be more physically active.
But all along, there was something missing. Although she was glad to see sports bras evolve and improve through the years—especially with more design input from women—she was frustrated that she couldn’t find underwear made for active women that was designed by women with both athletic apparel expertise and experience living an active lifestyle.
To her dismay, the one brand she knew and loved stopped making the style she’d been buying for years. And their new version, which had a different fabric and an odd cut, just didn’t work for her needs.
“I tried everything on the market,” Weihman said. “Even the ones made by bigger, well known brands, but none of them were designed for active women. Most were clearly designed by men. They weren’t seamless, they didn’t perform well and they often fell apart quickly.”
As an architectural and landscape designer, she knew how to take a concept and refine it over a series of prototypes. But she did not have any experience designing underwear. By 2019, her own frustration of not finding something that worked for her sparked the creation of Paradis Sport.
It started as a side project. While continuing to work on her architecture projects, Weihman searched for a designer to help her create a prototype with the specific design that she had in mind. The underwear category is notoriously difficult—quality control is tricky, margins aren’t great, and, for obvious reasons, it’s hard to please everyone.
But the deeper she got in her exploration of the field, the more motivated she became.
During the pandemic, Weihman reached out to friends and athletes, including her former Dartmouth field hockey and lacrosse teammates, to gather feedback on the category. She surveyed hundreds of current collegiate athletes and was shocked to learn that many of them were competing in their standard lace underwear—which was even more proof that there was clearly a problem for her to solve. And this was obviously her target audience. Athletic women. Active women. Women who run, ride, hike, ski, chase toddlers, workout, and live in motion.
Her underlying motivation? These women deserve high-quality products made from moisture-wicking fabrics that fit right and feel good, but without sacrificing any aspect of quality, comfort, or performance.
As with any high quality product, nothing good comes easy. It took Weihman eight rounds of prototypes and one and a half years to finalize the design for her first production. Over time she learned that making seamless apparel is tricky. Manufacturing requires specific machinery and handiwork only found in a small number of factories. Production often requires minimum orders of 3,000 units.
Eventually she had to throw caution to the wind and place this massive order with the hope that she was onto something. The company launched its first product, a seamless bikini, in 2021, and unveiled a natural fiber line in 2023.
Weihman and her design team have put a great deal of thought into material choices, and for good reason. Sustainability has always been very important to her since she studied under several very environmentally conscious professors in architecture school. She insisted on the highest level of sustainability standards for product design, manufacturing, and circularity.
Her seamless line is knit to shape so it’s a little different, but the goals are the same. Less is more, and green is good. She has sourced fabric made from sustainably harvested beech tree pulp for her natural fiber line, which is on the cutting-edge of apparel innovation. It’s both soft, stretchy, and performance-oriented, but, more importantly, it doesn’t have to end up in a landfill.
She launched a recycling program with Green Tree Textiles in New York City. The company offers free shipping labels to customers, for not just Paradis but any worn out underwear, to be sent into Green Tree so it can be recycled, which ultimately helps ensure a complete lifecycle of the product. Clearly, Weihman has thought of everything which is just so impressive.
“Women have always deserved better gear and we’re here to make it happen,” Weihman said. “I never imagined I’d have an underwear company, but this niche needs to be filled. This work is worth it.”
In November of 2023, Weihman began marketing the brand in earnest and found an ideal cohort in professional cyclist and avid Paradis Sport customer Laura King. A mom with two young kids, King is deeply committed to living actively. After her second child was born, she reached out to Weihman to let her know she’d been wearing Paradis underwear and absolutely loved it.
King came on first as a brand ambassador and then as an employee, where she hit the ground running and has been a huge part of the company’s growth. Laughing simply because of how wild it is, Weihman told me sales are up 260 percent since King joined the team. Oh, and side note, King recently punched her ticket to the gravel cycling world championships on October 11-12 in the Netherlands, so clearly she’s not messing around with what she’s wearing to ensure that she competes at her best.
Paradis Sport is now in 25 run specialty stores across the U.S. and one in Australia. Weihman feels good about the stores the brand is in, because they are places that have people who understand the product and can speak to the values of the brand and its underwear. Paradis is also one of 38 small women-led brands at Style of Our Own, a concept store on London’s Regent Street, which is the first store in the world dedicated entirely to women’s sports.
Instead of going headlong into large retailers, the company is focused on thoughtful growth through the Paradis Sport online store, small event activations, and the brand’s ambassador program, which Weihman and King put a lot of time and energy into cultivating.
Earlier this year, it launched its biggest marketing campaign to date featuring bold and beautiful photos of some of the brand’s athlete ambassadors—pro trail runners Hillary Allen and Amanda Basham, and age-group trail runner and gynecologist Lauren Puretz—wearing Paradis underwear shot on location on the trails in Boulder, Colorado. Another recent photo shoot in Vermont highlights active women in the brand’s Dawn to Dusk natural fiber underwear.
“I really love the brand and their ethos surrounding quality products for active women,” Allen said. “That’s why I said yes to being a part of their team. Both Laura and Sarah have first-hand experience on what it means to be a professional athlete and how specific needs of a woman athlete could be overlooked to just the general athlete—predominately men. Also Laura and Sarah are moms now who are very active and they are making their products with that in mind as well—not just catering to elite women, but every type of woman who moves.”
Weihman borrowed the name of her brand from Marie Paradis, a poor maidservant from Chamonix, France who, in 1808, was the first woman to reach the 15,777-foot summit of Mont Blanc. Paradis was wearing a wool dress and leather shoes and in a multi-day climbing party with seven men, but the amazing story about her strength, courage, and tenacity had somewhat been lost to history.
The connection with her story is that Weihman wants to bring strong, ambitious women athletes to the forefront—runners, triathletes, skiers, climbers, and mountaineers—and make sure they can perform at the highest level without compromise.
“Long-term, I want every woman to find her perfect pair of underwear,” Weihman told me. “It’s ambitious, but with innovation, customer connection, and an incredible team, we’re getting there.”
Listen to Women: From athlete surveys to ambassador input, we lead with listening.
Build What Lasts: Inspired by sustainable architecture – our products are meant to last.
Less is More: Design clean, effective, and minimal.
Sustainability: Source eco-conscious materials and offer recycling.
Accessibility: Educate customers, offer real support and create for a true range of bodies.
This article was produced in conjunction with Paradis Sport as part of a marketing sponsorship program. If you purchase from our links, we might receive an affiliate commission.
About the Author
Boston-area editor-at-large Rebecca Trachsel is a mom, a competitive age-group marathoner, a high school cross country and track coach, and music lover with a coffee problem. She’s still chasing big goals—and wearing super shoes—and having a blast along the way.
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