Our story
Independent furniture, lamps and homewares designers based in North Manchester
It's not just our products that have a story, we do too!
HausKat is the brainchild of makers Kat Durrant and Katy Brown.
So who are we?
HausKat wasn't born from a business plan. It was born from a turning point.
After more than twenty years working in web design and user experience, I (Kat) was made redundant. After a few months of job hunting (in an oversaturated market), Katy and I had a bit of a "real" conversation about what I actually wanted to do rather than what I should. She knew I'd always been interested in making things (our house is testament to that) and felt I owed it to myself to explore what that could look like.
I loved being creative, but somewhere along the way my days had become packed with back-to-back meetings, PowerPoint decks and conversations about work instead of actually doing it. I was burnt out, and if I'm honest, deeply unhappy.
So when redundancy came along, instead of seeing it as an ending, we saw it as an opportunity. Chances to completely change direction don't come around very often.
Make things and smile
One thing I remember saying to Katy when we first talked about starting HausKat was, "I'm happiest when I'm making things, cranking the music up and singing along while I work."
You can't really do that when you're sat in Teams calls all day.
Making things has always been part of who we are. Outside of our day jobs (Kat making digital products and Katy making teeth), we've spent years restoring our home, building furniture, learning new skills and filling every spare corner with unusual finds we've rescued from markets, salvage yards and car boot sales.
Mix that with a fascination for forgotten industrial pieces and their stories and a love of good design and HausKat slowly started to take shape.
Katy shares the same passion for breathing life back into things, she's always been interested in reusing and repurposing. She's there for every auction, every road trip, every "shall we buy it?" conversation and every slightly ridiculous idea that somehow turns into something brilliant.
We're also lifelong musicians, music lovers and proudly alternative at heart. Heavy metal, nu-metal, rock, punk, blues... we've always been drawn to things with authenticity, character and a bit of attitude.
Looking back, it's no surprise that those same values have found their way into everything we create.
A whole lot of history
Every HausKat piece starts with something that already has a story to tell.
We clean, restore, rework and reinvent each one into something with a brand-new purpose, while making sure it never loses the character that made us fall in love with it in the first place.
Some pieces might share an idea or inspiration, but no two are ever exactly the same.
HausKat is for people who'd rather own something with soul than something straight from a warehouse. People whose playlists are as eclectic as their homes. People who value craftsmanship, sustainability and the stories hidden beneath decades of scratches, dents and honest wear.
Because the best things aren't brand new.
They're simply waiting for someone to write their next chapter.
Are you german?
This is probably a question we'll get asked about ... and the answer is no, we're not.
The story actually starts years ago when I used to wear glasses. A friend at university told me I looked Germanic. I never really saw it myself, but I mentioned it to Katy early in our relationship and, without missing a beat, she replied, "You do!"
Then it kept happening.
On holiday in Madeira, we shared a hotel shuttle bus with a German couple who happily struck up a conversation with us in German. We had to interrupt with a very British, "Sorry... we're British."
A few years later, in a gay bar in Ibiza, we got chatting to a lovely couple from Berlin. Katy couldn't resist asking them, "Do you think she looks German?" Their reply?
"Oh ja... a babe from the Black Forest."
Needless to say, Katy was absolutely delighted.
Then, on a work trip to Tenerife, I walked up to the duty-free till without saying a word, and the cashier looked at me and asked, "Are you German?"
Apparently the evidence was mounting.
These days it happens far less often (it turns out having laser eye surgery did wonders for returning to my roots), but the story has stuck with us.
So when it came to naming the business, we thought we'd give it a little nod. Haus felt like the perfect fit for a business centred around homes, craftsmanship and character, while Kat... well, that one was fairly obvious.
And that's how we decided on our name.