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This must be the place.
Kate Kelly Design is the place for unique, whimsical, custom illustrations and art for weddings, the home, stationery and more. It's also the place for cool bags and stuff for your home. I use art and design to help tell your story and make your world a more beautiful place to be.
Hi. My name is Kate, and I’m the gal behind Kate Kelly Design.
I started Kate Kelly Design and its accompanying blog "A la recherche" (translation "In Search") in 2013 after a lifetime of dreaming. KKD began as a “passion project” on the side while I worked full time in financial services. And in 2020, after 14 years in finance, in the midst of the pandemic, I realized there wasn’t a moment to lose, threw caution to the wind and quit my “day job” so I could put my all into KKD.
I am an artist, illustrator and designer. My aesthetic is a dynamic mix of high and low, modern and antique, American and worldly, and is in constant flux as my travels and experiences inform my worldview. I grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, attended Dartmouth College in New Hampshire where I studied Comparative Literature in French Philosophy and dabbled in Studio Art, lived abroad in Paris and finally landed in New York, where I have studied Interior Design at Parsons School of Design (where an interior rendering class reignited my childhood love of watercolors) and completed my MBA at Columbia Business School. Trips to Asia, Africa and the American West and a lengthy stint in the Hamptons (thanks, 2020!) have further influenced my aesthetic, and I can't wait for my next cultural journey whenever COVID allows. I met my now-lawyer-husband Matt in college, married him in 2010 (further inspiring my love of all things wedding), and now have free rein to bother him with questions like, "Do you have an opinion on these bookcases?" (He always does.) We spent 2015 and 2016 renovating our apartment and welcomed our sons Michael in 2016 and Theo in 2018 - we have never loved anything more. Michael and Theo are my muses and inspire me to see the world through their eyes - a world of color and wonder and imagination (and monsters, lots of monsters). My creative focus is on making things beautiful, unique and personal through color, paint, texture and space. And my personal focus is on helping others get inspired to share with the world their ideas and vision. To tell their story through art. To make their world a little more beautiful. To feel heard. To find home. To realize they’re already there. And to do it with a wink and a little whimsy.
I am an artist, illustrator and designer. My aesthetic is a dynamic mix of high and low, modern and antique, American and worldly, and is in constant flux as my travels and experiences inform my worldview. I grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, attended Dartmouth College in New Hampshire where I studied Comparative Literature in French Philosophy and dabbled in Studio Art, lived abroad in Paris and finally landed in New York, where I have studied Interior Design at Parsons School of Design (where an interior rendering class reignited my childhood love of watercolors) and completed my MBA at Columbia Business School. Trips to Asia, Africa and the American West and a lengthy stint in the Hamptons (thanks, 2020!) have further influenced my aesthetic, and I can't wait for my next cultural journey whenever COVID allows. I met my now-lawyer-husband Matt in college, married him in 2010 (further inspiring my love of all things wedding), and now have free rein to bother him with questions like, "Do you have an opinion on these bookcases?" (He always does.) We spent 2015 and 2016 renovating our apartment and welcomed our sons Michael in 2016 and Theo in 2018 - we have never loved anything more. Michael and Theo are my muses and inspire me to see the world through their eyes - a world of color and wonder and imagination (and monsters, lots of monsters). My creative focus is on making things beautiful, unique and personal through color, paint, texture and space. And my personal focus is on helping others get inspired to share with the world their ideas and vision. To tell their story through art. To make their world a little more beautiful. To feel heard. To find home. To realize they’re already there. And to do it with a wink and a little whimsy.
KKD Core Values
KKD is about love, celebration, self-expression, diversity and inclusion. It's about the beauty around and in all of us. It's about living a life that is true to you. KKD advocates for anti-racism and the equality of all humankind. If this is not your value set, I invite you to shop elsewhere. But before you do, I invite you first to have a conversation with me to help get you on the right side of the fence so that we can together dismantle systemic racism and advocate for the equality of all. I believe in a "you do you" philosophy but have a hard stance on racism, classism and genderism and would venture to say that if you're lukewarm in this space, you're in fact not "doing you" to the fullest.
With love, celebration and inclusion,
Kate
With love, celebration and inclusion,
Kate