Behind the Design: Kate Gouws

 

 

For this collection, Kate embraced a creative collaboration with Samantha Varvel, creating Kit’s Butterflies, Peter’s Posies, and Samantha's Songbirds from Samantha's personal style. Drawing inspiration from traditional chinoiserie, pear trees, and Indian block prints, Kate began with nature-inspired sketches, refined them with watercolor, and completed the process digitally. Discover more below about Kate's artistic execution and the elegant collection that seamlessly blends Petite Keep + Samantha's inspirations!

 

You’ve already created a delightful Holiday print for us, and more recently, the timeless, Petite Party print! How did the process of designing Kit’s Butterflies, Peter’s Posies + Sam’s Songbirds differ from your previous prints? To start off, working with Samantha on this collection was an absolute treat. Her entire aesthetic is to die for and it’s always a lot of fun collaborating with other creatives. Working with her was a new aspect to this collection for me. I really enjoyed hearing her vision for the collection and allowing my own creative process to be influenced by hers. I think what we came up with really is such a beautiful collaboration, representing both her elegant, feminine aesthetic and my whimsical artistry. 

What inspired you when creating Kit’s Butterflies, Peter’s Posies, and Sam’s Songbirds? Was there a specific moment or memory that guided your artistic vision? Kit’s Butterflies and Sam’s Songbirds are inspired by both the traditional chinoiserie print and pear trees. I had a vision to create a pattern that both flowed in an organic and whimsical way but had the structure of a chinoiserie print. Peter’s Posies was a spin off of the traditional block print originating in India. These seemingly flat and static floral designs are replicated into a pattern that brings stability and symmetry. Created originally in watercolor, the flower’s edges are soft and fluid, getting lost in the background and transitioning your eye onto the next design. 

 

Could you walk us through your creative process when designing for a specific theme? How do you begin? I always begin the dreaming phase by finding inspiration that drives my creative project. Many times I look to nature and photography of flowers to find inspiration. Then, like most artists, it starts with a blank page in large mix media drawing pad. I tell myself anything is allowed on this page, whether it’s going to make it into the final design or not. Like many creative processes, I have to go through several bad ideas until I get to my good one. Beginning with pencil, I sketch and write in this free space allowing myself to find the design within my work. I reworked the pieces that I want to emphasize by increasing their scale and allowing for more details. After erasing out the pencil ever so slightly, I begin applying watercolor. I work and rework until they are at a place I am happy with, and then I digitally render each of them and rework on my iPad, giving it the perfect definition it needs to be printed.