Bike

Fashion

Lifestyle

Outdoor

Snow

Streetwear

Swim

Vice President of Design

Executive

I'm a Design Director with 15 years experience in advanced concept development, creative direction, inspiring, mentoring and leading large design teams to accomplish common goals, driving the design and development process from initial sketch to commercialization, developing innovative materials and constructions, while building strong partnerships with other unit leaders to ensure a successful go to market strategy. I'm passionate about building innovative athlete driven product solutions and delivering commercially viable active apparel collections, I’ve spent the majority of my career leading design and concept groups focused on the active industry segment. I’ve led multiple startup initiatives focused on advanced development, strategic repositioning of the brand and innovation, aiming to bring in award winning products with a unique POV for the athletic consumer.


Providing Creative Leadership and Seasonal Design Direction to the relaunch efforts of Xterra Sports. Leading cross functional design, development, creative, innovation and materials teams, while setting the global brand aesthetic, product seasonal creative concept, graphic design POV and seasonal material/ trim direction. Partnering with Chief Merchandising Officer to create and launch compelling product stories, collaborating with Marketing on creating a cohesive brand direction across multiple channels including digital, photography direction, events branding and consumer packaging.  Working collaboratively and cross functionally to accomplish a global product launch across multiple categories including triathlon, training, trail run, lifestyle apparel, accessories and footwear.

Non Compete period

Providing Creative direction for the Outdoor Categories as the brand relaunched it’s Outdoor line including the initial launch of Outdoor Lifestyle and Reactor, relaunch of Snow-sports and Women’s Outerwear, relaunch of Hunting and Fishing categories. Responsible for creating the design aesthetic for UnderArmour in the Outdoor space from initial product positioning, trend and color research, advanced concept and material development, thru product commercialization, marketing and product messaging. Working collaboratively and cross functionally to accomplish large scale successful product launches across multiple categories. Managing a team of in house designers and a number of freelance resources and over $600M in revenue.

Design Director

Managing design and development of all Outdoor Categories including Outerwear, Active Apparel, Accessories, Equipment, HF, Footwear, Home and Travel. Re-launched Outdoor Apparel category at LLBean for men’s and Women’s, building the team and business plan to position the category for successful growth. Responsible for defining the signature aesthetic of LLBean, creating and maintaining aesthetic guardrails of the brand image and collaborating on a Brand Design Continuum project to define the brand image. Responsible for seasonal trend research, creation and execution of seasonal concepts and color stories, advanced research & development, color palette finalization, overseeing fabric development/selection, silhouette and trim detailing, sampling, garment costing, fit sessions thru final line adoption. Overseeing a design department managing a team of thirteen, a number of freelance resources and over $700M in product revenue.  

Senior Design Manager

Responsible for the design and development of all Men's,Women's and Kid’s Outerwear and Accessories. Initiated all creative concepts and aspects of seasonal collections including advance conceptualization, research, and development of seasonal themes, color palettes, development of new and innovative material platforms, prints, logos, and silhouette direction. Responsible for the generation of spec /detail packages, sample reviews and giving direction at product fittings. Daily communication with design team, merchandising, marketing, creative, and production departments, as well as fit specialists, factories, and agents while managing an outerwear design team. Built and managed a strong team and created a succession plan for the outerwear design group.

Senior Designer

Responsible for the design, management & development of concepts, colors, models, and fabrications for multiple Outerwear classification accounts including Nicole Miller, Rockport, Jhane Barnes and Ellie Tahari. Emphasis on color and trend research, material sourcing, concept development, silhouette, sample development and fit. Delivered 8 seasonal collections of classification Outerwear a year for Bloomingdales, Nordstrom, Barney's and specialty retailers. 

Outerwear Designer

Find out detailed information about Kat Schoewe, Vice President of Design in Portland, OR

Kat Schoewe: Vice President of Design in Portland, OR

Kat Schoewe

Fashion Institute of Technology

SUNY Purchase