Kate Spade Women's Fashion Brand

Kate Valentine, formerly known as Kate Spade, is an American fashion designer and businesswoman. She is the namesake and former co-owner of the designer brand Kate Spade New York. That short introduction carries two facts a shopper should hold together: a real designer whose name is on the door, and the words former co-owner, which signal that the brand's ownership story - told in full below - moved on from its founder. The name on a Kate Spade bag is a person's name.

It all started back in 1993, when Kate Brosnahan Spade, a former accessories editor at Mademoiselle, set out to design the perfect handbag. Debuting with just six silhouettes, she combined sleek, utilitarian shapes and colorful palettes in an entirely new way - and so Kate Spade New York was born. Every element of that founding sentence is a product clue: an accessories editor's eye, a search for a perfect handbag rather than a decorative one, six silhouettes only, sleek and utilitarian in shape, and colour used boldly against that utility. The brand's whole later world grows from that contrast - practical shapes, joyful colour.

Ownership: Neiman Marcus, Liz Claiborne, Coach and Tapestry

In 2006, she sold the last of her shares in that company. Neiman Marcus Group purchased 56% of the Kate Spade brand in 1999, and it acquired the remaining 44% in 2006. Neiman Marcus then sold the Kate Spade label for $124 million in 2006 to Liz Claiborne Inc., which was later renamed to Fifth & Pacific. In February 2014, Fifth & Pacific changed its name to Kate Spade & Company. Coach, Inc. acquired Kate Spade for 2.4 billion dollars in May 2017. Then in October 2017, Coach changed its corporate name to Tapestry. That chain is given here complete, because in a designer directory the ownership record IS the brand record - each transfer explains the era of product a secondhand or archive piece comes from.

Apparel Search's own Tapestry company profile is linked from this page, as is the directory's Kate Spade designer page. For a shopper, the practical use of the chain is dating and expectation: a 1999-2006 piece is a Neiman Marcus-era product, a later piece belongs to the Liz Claiborne / Fifth & Pacific / Kate Spade & Company years, and current product sits inside Tapestry, the renamed Coach, Inc., which paid $2.4 billion for the brand in May 2017 - a valuation that states plainly how large the six-silhouette handbag idea had become.

A Global Lifestyle Brand, and Frances Valentine

Today they have grown into a global lifestyle brand, and aim to inspire colorful living through their handbags and clothing to jewelry, shoes, eyewear, fragrance, etc. Colorful living is the brand's stated aim, and the category list shows its reach: the handbags it began with, then clothing, jewelry, shoes, eyewear and fragrance. Shop it on the founding formula - choose the sleek, utilitarian shape that fits your actual carrying life first, then let the colorful palette make the choice yours. A bag that organises your day and lifts your mood is precisely the 1993 idea, still working.

In 2016, Kate Spade and her partners officially launched a new fashion brand called Frances Valentine - the founder's next chapter, told on the directory's Frances Valentine page, which sits in the F section of this same brands directory. That link matters to the record: the designer who sold her last shares in her namesake company in 2006 returned a decade later with a new name of her own. The brand's official site, katespade.com is linked in References below. An accessories editor, six silhouettes in 1993, a $124 million sale in 2006, a $2.4 billion acquisition in 2017, and a founder who started again as Frances Valentine: Kate Spade New York is the K letter's colourful lifestyle brand.

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