Talk Shop: Katie Leede // Katie Leede & Co.
ABOUT KATIE
Katie Leede is principal of New York City-based Katie Leede & Company. Her focus is on interior decoration as well as the design and marketing of her own textiles, wallpapers and furnishings. Katie draws inspiration from her extensive global travels and her love of Nature. She has a BA in theater arts from Dartmouth and pursued an acting career before turning her eye to interior design.
Last July, Katie opened up a home decor shop in Sag Harbor, which sells mostly vintage carpets, antiques, art by local artists and various home goods. Katie’s work, which ranges from the soft contemporary to the relaxed traditional in projects across the country, has been featured in Veranda, Luxe, World of Interiors, House Beautiful, Elle Decor and numerous other magazines and blogs. She has appeared on the TV program "Open House New York" and was recently named to Luxe's 2021 Gold List. Katie is proud to serve on the boards of The Decorators Club of New York, The Atlantic Theater Company and the Addison Gallery of American Art. We’re thrilled to have her on #TalkShop, read her design tips and more below!
Describe your style in three words or less:
Collected, cozy and artful
What have been the three biggest influences on your aesthetic in your life:
My mom, traveling, and museums
How did you start your company, and/or what is your favorite thing about what you do:
I fell into interior design by chance. Friends started hiring me to help with their homes and offices because they liked my style.
Co-creating homes that clients are emotionally invested in-that they fall in love with, that work for them not only aesthetically but also practically, and where they can continue to build rich memories-fills me with a great deal of personal satisfaction.
Do you have a mentor in your career, and if so, how have they helped to shape your trajectory:
My parents and my four brothers are my true mentors, not stylistically, but through their modeling determination through ups and downs, their admirable values and fierce work ethics , and-most importantly- their loving capacity for caretaking (especially of me!:)) and just doing the right thing. At different times in my varied career, I’ve gotten knocked off my horse multiple times. Because of their role models, I don’t see these tumbles as failures per se but as opportunities to get up, dust off my britches and start again. Resilience is everything.
What does your home say about you:
That I value livability, conviviality and easy entertaining, togetherness, and relaxation. It’s an eclectic mix of collected family antiques and art, comfortable new-ish upholstery and things picked up along our travels.
Where do you find inspiration:
Everywhere! Street style, Instagram, the color of the sky and Nature generally (of course!), a dish at a favorite restaurant, design and art books, The Met (!), auctions, and shopping. For starters.
Who are your style icons:
My mom, Georgia O’Keefe, Millicent Rogers, Iris Apfel, Diane Keaton AND Diane Von Furstenberg, Billie Eilish, my fun and colorful friends, and-slowly but surely-my daughter..basically, anyone following their own star.
What are your key ingredients for entertaining:
Freshest, most delicious ingredients for a home-cooked meal, using china everyday for every meal (I put mine in the dishwasher), pretty napkins (preferably pressed), music, always candles (both votive and taller), easy flowers (can be simple sprigs from the garden) or tangerines tossed on the table for color, and-most importantly-people you love interspersed with people who bring a lot ( i.e. an interesting perspective) to the conversation.
Do you collect anything:
Out of print books on textiles and far-flung cultures..and people, I suppose. I love people.
Favorite Instagram accounts to follow for inspiration:
@kellybehunstudio, @beataheuman, @altforliving, and @amandacbrooks.
What design “rule” do you always follow, and which is made to be broken:
Listen to your clients and then choose your battles. Be willing to make their homes theirs. Breaking the rule involves educating them about choices that might just be better for them and their house over the long haul.
What are you working on right now:
Launching our latest wallpaper collection, getting ready for our spring/summer season at our new home shop in Sag Harbor, a handsome old-world Virginia estate, (soon) a modern cliff-side residence in Austin, and a ramshackle beach house in Southampton.
Wardrobe staples:
Big jewelry, I pezzi Di Pinti scarves, slip-on all-star converse sneakers, Celine culottes that go with everything, baggy jeans, embroidered shirts, and-in the summer-fun straw hats, my favorite being from Morocco with shells stitched on it.
Favorite fabric/wallpaper:
Obviously, I love our Katie Leede and Company line of fabrics and wallpapers but I never tire of Robert Kime’s Suzani (red colorway) print , Lisa Fine’s “Baroda” ,or Penny Morrison’s terrific woven called “Ticking Stripe.” Also, I live for all things Rosemary Halgarten. De la Cuona’s heavy linen “Warrior Cloth” always does the trick for me, as well.
Best interior advice you ever received:
Break up symmetry in a room to create a more artful, personalized atmosphere...you still get the feeling of a well-balanced and structured space even if pairs of things (be they chairs or lamps or pillows) are scattered throughout a space instead of arranged more formally in an expected, stricter way.
Best career advice you ever received:
Give more than you expect to receive. There is plenty of work to go around so share your resources and expertise generously. All that good karma will boomerang back tenfold. Also, invest in a great, trustworthy bookkeeper (and design program that suits) and run your business, well, like a business. Keep your eyes open to the bottom line. Never stop investing in expanding your professional network and in the well being of your team. Be kind, be kind, be kind.
Types of home purchases you invest in, and save on:
Vintage lighting and carpets.
You can get one-of-a kind things at estate sales and auctions for a steal.
Your greatest extravagance:
Restaurants and hotels...eating well is a joy but there is always something to learn from cleverly designed hospitality spaces.
Favorite places to shop for home:
I am definitely going virtual so -if not London, Paris or the Medinas of Morocco or the dusty shops of Jaipur and Jodphur - then 1st Dibs, Chairish and In Collect...and also, my shop!
Most prized possession and why:
I love two large scale paintings I bought in Soho forever ago for my first apartment in NYC. That’s when Soho was still only where artists and drug addicts lived and you could wander around huge, vintage furniture shops on Sundays and art galleries were all there was up and down West Broadway. Those paintings remind me of then and now as they have kept me and eventually my family company every place I have lived since.
Your interiors motto:
Make it feel like magic.
Your life motto:
There are no excuses.
Advice for developing personal interior style:
Get curious, Study carefully the interiors you love and ask yourself exactly WHY DOES THIS THRILL ME SO? Is it the layout? The colors, furniture, artwork, architecture, view, what? What makes it sing? And continually choose to take heart and inspiration from the courage of those whose style you admire. Copy them shamelessly and follow in their footsteps until you get your own stylistic footing. Who are their resources to get things done? Look in the back of the magazines and start using their peeps. You will learn buckets about your own style by this learning-as-you-go approach. And remember:progress not perfection. Have fun. Just follow everything YOU love.
Take Ten: My Favorite…
Food: Fresh Fish and veggies anywhere
Drink: Nantucket Fog: Heineken mixed with one shot of silver tequila (I use Patron)
Film: Toss up between Ingmar Bergman’s “Fanny and Alexander” and Woody Allen’s “Annie Hall”
Hotel: We just got back from the hyper chill Casa Violetta in Tulum and I am already ready to go back!
I like certain hotels to stay in like The Mauna Kea Beach Hotel in Hawaii or at any of Kit Kemp’s quirky, art-full places in London. Then some hotels are divine for breakfast like on the terrace of the Gritti Palace in Venice, or a buffet lunch poolside at La Mamounia in Marrakech or chic drinks at Connaught Bar in London. Hotel Costes in Paris if people watching is a desired sport for the evening. And then what would life be without sunset dinner overlooking the Medirerranean at the impossibly romantic Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc in Antibes or on the quaint porch of The American Hotel in Sag Harbor. I mean, the list goes on and on and on...
City: Paris
Bedding: Fresh pressed Pratessi
Tea or Coffee (and how do you take it): Drip coffee made at home with “Dreamy” Blend from “Sylvester and Co. Sag Harbor” with steamed oak milk, preferably expertly prepared by my darling daughter Lucia.
Playlist: I listen to Spectrum radio...always an eclectic mix of artists and sounds from past and present but all great pretty much. I also like to listen to Oprah’s “Master Class” podcasts and Zane Lowe’s intimate interviews with singer/songwriters like Lady Gaga.
Weekend Activity: running on the beach, biking, entertaining, shopkeeping and-hopefully- reading and sleeping and hanging with hubby
Design Book: Right now I am obsessed with “Rattan” by Lulu Lytle , owner of Soane Furnishings and Textiles.
