STYLE INFLUENCER
Katie Laughridge & Kate Foster Proprietress and Fabric Manager of Midwest Home Décor Store Nell Hill’s
Katie Laughridge’s love of textiles led her to acquire the iconic Kansas-based home interiors lifestyle shop Nell Hill’s in 2019, after dreaming for years of owning a small business. Katie moved the stylish boutique to its new location in Briarcliff Village, Kansas City from its original site in Atchinson, Kansas, where it was established in 1981 by Mary Carol Garrity and named after her pioneer grandmother. Born and raised in Kansas City, Katie is happy to continue nurturing and growing this well-known local establishment with a far-reaching influence. Nell Hill’s welcomes guests from all over the country who gravitate to the store that exudes lifestyle and design inspiration and is filled with beautiful furniture, artwork, lighting, fabric by the yard and accents. Along with owning and operating Nell Hill’s, Katie is the author of the weekly decorating blog Style at Home and a syndicated weekly column. Her favorite place to be is at Nell Hill’s, helping clients to create homes that are lovely and livable and that celebrate their own style. “At Nell Hill’s we want to encourage the idea that what you like is ALWAYS in style,” she says on the store’s website. “Enhance your unique, personal style here with us. I can’t wait to go on your design journey with you.” Working by her side for the last 3 years in the vital position of Fabric Manager has been Kate Foster, who says she loves to find new and exciting trends to bring to the shop. Nell Hill’s is known as an influential curator of New Traditional design, creating something new and exciting from timeless elements. Take a virtual peak at the Nell Hill’s point of view by visiting nellhills.com or Katie’s Style at Home blog at nellhills.com/blog-index/. What are your go-to paint colors? Katie and Kate: We are both obsessed with Winter Wheat from our Nell Hill’s paint line. We each have it painted on our walls at home! Recently we have been recommending new pops of color for bold walls like Mulberry Drive, Flint Hills and Ward Parkway Brick as well.
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What are your favorite sources of inspiration? How have you incorporated this inspiration into your designs, product development or merchandising? Katie: We get a lot of inspiration from social media actually! Kate and I find ourselves browsing Instagram and sending each other trends and colors that we love so we can figure out a way to make it our own. Markets are also a great place for us to find new ideas. Overall, though, Nell Hill’s is always looking back at classic and timeless design and seeing how we can create something new and exciting – I mean that is what New Traditional design is all about. Kate: We are definitely known for our timeless fabrics. Recently we were looking back on traditional patterns like toile, and talking about how we could bring that type of pattern into the store in a fresh way. While we were
