32 | JUNE 23 • 2022 

W

hen her younger sister, 
Amanda, was gearing up for 
her 21st birthday in November 
2020, Claudia Halpern knew she had to do 
something special to help Amanda have a 
memorable celebration despite the ongoing 
COVID-19 pandemic.
“We couldn’t go to bars,
” Halpern, 27, of 
Farmington Hills, recalls. Instead, she brain-
stormed with Amanda’s boyfriend on how 
to throw a party for her sister, despite the 

restrictions that prevented them from cele-
brating in traditional 21st birthday fashion.
They decided to throw a small house 
party for Amanda’s birthday, but Claudia 
knew proper decorations were in order. “I 
started thinking about things that we can 
do,
” she says. “I was like, ‘Oh, I’m going to 
make a balloon arch.
’ How cool would that 
be?’”
With a history of working for event plan-
ners, planning her sister’s birthday party 

came naturally to Halpern. Seeing the cus-
tom balloon arch turning into a success and 
the process of bringing it to life gave her an 
idea to start making party decorations on 
the side.
It was the beginning of Party Sistas, a 
business in which Halpern could specialize 
in party design, college bed parties, bar cart 
styling, balloon arches and balloon backdrop 
kits. She worked with her sister in launch-
ing the idea, but when Amanda moved to 
Florida, Claudia Halpern was in charge of 
the business on her own and had to pivot.

CREATING JOY WITH CANDY
“In February 2021, I was browsing online, 
and I saw someone made a box for some-
one with candy in it,
” she recalls. Deciding 
to make a similar box for kids she babysat, 
Halpern posted her colorful creation on 
Facebook and received numerous requests 
to make more.
Could she make candy boxes for birth-
days and bat mitzvahs, people asked? From 
there, Halpern realized candy boxes could 
be the focal point of her business.
“It happened by accident, in a way,
” she 
says. Her style — which Halpern explains 
is positive and happy, something that puts 
smiles on people’s faces — became more and 
more in-demand, transforming Party Sistas 

 The 
Candy 
Woman

Through colorful candy, Claudia Halpern 
makes stunningly sweet creations.

ASHLEY ZLATOPOLSKY CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Claudia 
Halpern

MARLEE JADE PHOTOGRAPHY

NEXT DOR

VOICE OF THE NEW 
JEWISH GENERATION

