Designer Cate Holstein of Khaite talks about how New York City influences her creatively from Woody Allen to 'Sex and the City' & more.
Through the decades, New York fashion has had many defining designers: Bill Blass, Halston, Geoffrey Beene, Oscar de la Renta, Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren, Donna Karan, and Marc Jacobs among them. This moment belongs to Cate Holstein. It’s her time., where she will show Sept. 7. With a recent investment from private equity firm Stripes, she is opening stores in Dallas’ Highland Park Village, on Madison Avenue in New York and at Costa Mesa, Calif.
Before her high school senior year, she spent the summer in a Parsons pre-college program and was smitten. It was 2002, and the city was still coming off the ’90s. “That is the aesthetic of New York I really homed in on. You could still smoke in restaurants and bars, we didn’t really have any issues getting carded, and I’m not gonna lie, it was prime ‘Sex and the City,’ and that had a big impression on me,” she says, clarifying that she’s an ex-smoker now.
In her early 20s, she was shopping at the SoHo boutique Kirna Zabête, captivated by the clothing of the crop of young independent women designers who had their own labels at the time, including Alice Roi, Behnaz Sarafpour and particularly Katyone Adeli. “I think she captured how women wanted to look at that moment,” Holstein says. “And then Earl Jeans. I mean, that was the new wave of denim.
The woman she envisioned as her muse was “fiercely independent, stealth strong and confident in her insecurities — understanding that she maybe isn’t totally comfortable in her own skin, but she’s trying to get there,” she says. “And discerning.”The brand grew from must-have sweaters and denim to ready-to-wear, with much-copied bodysuits and sculpted bustier tops, hit bags and boots in its first few years, including the Aimee clutch, and the Dallas Western boots.
To wit, Holstein will be amping up paid advertising both in media and on Instagram, but recently turned the Khaite Instagram account inactive, wiping the grid almost entirely. “I don’t want to ruin the mystique, but, um, no, she’s not a dark person,” says Frazen. “She has a dark sense of humor.” The infusion of capital last year from Stripes has created new opportunities. And even that has felt like family, she says. “It’s a partnership and I could not speak higher of the level of humanity and understanding there. Yes, it’s private equity but it’s a very different kind of private equity in it for the long term and creatively led…not working solely for the bottom line.”
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