Editors Letter
The art of taxidermy | By Amy Hurst
The idea of ‘making something beautiful forever’-Kate. My project is based on the independent company ‘Dead things by Kate’ which is single handily owned and run by Kate Egan, 30. She lives in Maccelsfield market town in Cheshire which is also the home of her up and coming store.
Her business only started 18 months ago and already has a huge interest with 20–30 parcels being sent all over the globe every week, 35.8k followers on Instagram and hundreds of emails and messages everyday from both customers and fans. Her ever growing business which started as a small hobby is continuing to grow and acquiring interest from a variety of different people.
After spending months shadowing and following Kate through her business I found that not only is her business and what she is doing interesting, but she is also an interesting character and unique with her own style and personality. She has a strong opinion on her work and that all her pieces are and have to be ethically sourced, as well as all the make up she uses on herself is animal cruelty free. She has a strong opinion on animal cruelty and what she does is no exception. Although she might get the odd remark that what she is doing is wrong in unhuman she knows herself that what she is doing is making them animals beautiful forever and allowing them to live on in other peoples lives.
An interesting interesting fact about the company is that nearly half of her customers are actually in fact vegans. With all her animals being ethically sourced and not killed for her pieces, this makes her piece’s vegan friendly. Kate herself was a past vegan however, after falling ill she had to add meat back into her diet for medical reasons.
My project looks at her work and how she presents herself to the public whilst at her markets and online on social media. Her website and Instagram are her main platforms of communication for her. Allowing people to see her as a person and ‘Dead things by Kate’ up and coming pieces. I think using her business account as a personal and business account is a great way for people to get to know her more and the business, giving it that personal touch.
All her pieces are hand made and packaged by hand making them personal and different for every customer. This way she says ‘people get the quality I want them to have’ using local sources for the framing, paper and extra pieces that go into her work which might make her products slightly more expensive she says but she wants them to be a good quality and too last.
