About

Kate Owen spent her formative years living in several locations across the USA, particularly a little mountain town in Colorado. Her family emigrated to Bristol, UK, where she studied at the RWA before moving to London to study textile design at Central St Martins in 2006.  

 

Her career has been spent as a fabric buyer in the fashion industry, as well as pursuing her own design work. Her pieces draw on early American folk traditions and focus on quilting and patchwork, evoking the ‘patchwork’ of her identity through bespoke handmade pieces. 

 

The origins of patchwork being used to recycle off-cuts of fabric reflects a particular focus on sustainability in her work, and her career as a fabric buyer has given her a keen awareness of the potential for creative use of excess materials. Combining a love of colour and traditional craft, she makes patchwork quilts, wallhangings, cushions, and quilt kits, as well as designing prints. 

 

She is based in Peckham, London, and regularly teaches both group and one-to-one quilting classes.