Whether it is jewelry or clothing, designer Katherine “Kat” Schlattman tries to balance the fragility of objects with the strength of their materials. That can be the strength of a stitch, the hardness of a diamond, or the permanence of her impact on the world.
Schlattman is the founder of Foe & Dear, a Vancouver, Canada, jewelry brand that follows her personal mission of being eco-conscious, sustainable, and ethically responsible. This commitment in jewelry comes from her life’s experiences and also her desire to do things a bit differently.
That includes her business being a member of 1% for the Planet, an organization that helps companies commit to giving 1% of their gross sales to approved environmental nonprofit partners. This membership ensures Foe & Dear is giving with the greatest impact and creating a healthy planet in the process.
Foe & Dear started in 2009, Schlattman says, but the whirlwind up to that point taught her lifelong lessons that got her jewelry business off the ground. Her first high school job was at a small café near her Vancouver childhood home, and it taught her responsibility, managing her schedule, and the power of disposable income, she says.
Schlattman started out with an eye for apparel, graduating from Ryerson University in 2007 with a bachelor’s in fashion design.
“My university education has taught me a lot of fundamental skills that I still use to this day. Even though garment design is completely different from jewelry design, a lot of skills cross over,” Schlattman says. This includes “learning how to kick my brain into design mode at any point in time, how to collect and save inspiration, working on a million things at once, and keeping my cool under extreme stress situations.”
In 2008, she got a job at Abercrombie & Fitch as its human resources and visual manager in Toronto—and this is really where the whirlwind began.
“The brand had just entered the Canadian market, and I was hired to open the Toronto flagship store. Our store was filled with like-minded, 20-somethings that were just trying to find their way, living in a hugely intimidating downtown environment, while learning how to run a multi-million-dollar store all at the same time,” Schlattman says. “There are so many wonderful people that I’ve kept in contact with over the years who have found their passions.”
Around this time, her childhood jewelry hobby that continued through university started to take off. The barriers to entry to become an independent fashion designer had taken their toll, so Schlattman pinched pennies to save for a move to New York, where she interned with a jewelry designer in Brooklyn.
It was at that Brooklyn shop where she learned how events, workshops, and custom designs could create community, and Foe & Dear came out of those moments.
“It’s truly an amazing experience to be able to grow something that started out as collecting rocks and wire wrapping to learning how to metalsmith, sourcing precious gemstones and diamonds, and running a successful business,” Schlattman says. “Jewelry is very meaningful to me and to others; it can be a very precious object that passes through generations to carry on legacies and special moments.”
Top: Katherine “Kat” Schlattman started Foe & Dear as a way to express her lifetime interest in jewelry, which grew during her years in the fashion industry and the whirlwind of working at major apparel retailers (photos courtesy of Foe & Dear).
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