A shining example of a woman who has pursued her goal in life with passion and verve whilst creating and maintaining great relationships and a family.

Katie decided as a teenager that a life in graphic design was her ambition. Despite the usual challenges for creative people in school she survived and thrived and gained her degree in graphic design. 

Gaining a wage plus great experience she worked for publications such as The Daily Express Newspaper, The Sunday Supplement, OK Magazine, The Daily Telegraph, Hachette Filipacchi and the BBC.

With a lot of hard work and determination she gained her dream job as a Senior Designer with a large creative agency. She saw from the inside, what clients expected and appreciated. Her work was highly thought of and she excelled when winning new business pitches. Katie got a reputation for fresh design concepts which matched a client’s aspirations and corporate tone. Clients included: Danone, Tilda, Lavazza, Hobart and Jamie Oliver.

Katie decided her next goal was running her own design business, where she could manage the client’s journey from start to finish and where she could work with both well established businesses and start ups. She got great satisfaction from helping business people succeed via designing innovative marketing campaigns and rebranding and began to visualise and research her future.

In 2014 Katie took the plunge and started her own business – Gladstone Design – a complete design solution for any business, large or small. During the planning stage, Katie had realised that what businesses needed was not just a designer with stunning ideas but also a tailored solution, seamlessly incorporating brand creation through to shop fitting, print, packaging, marketing and website. 

It seems like a tall order, to leap from the certainty of paid employment to successful business, but that is what Katie has done – and her client testimonials go to show that her responsive and dynamic work has been appreciated and that she has been recommended over and over again. I know how pleased and touched Katie has been by the positive reaction to her business especially within the local business community.

Katie’s main reward in her business is the joy she feels, seeing the businesses she has worked with go from strength to strength with their inspirational new logos and designs across all media communicating their entrepreneurial energy.

She also hugely enjoys working directly with her clients, being responsive and reactive in a way only a small business can be. She loves the challenge of producing fast turn-arounds and capturing in her design work the spirit of the businesses and brands she works with. This is a very personal service which larger design businesses struggle to provide, making her work and this business unique.

Katie has big plans for Gladstone Designs. She recently created a position in the business for her husband; also a designer, to ensure that her clients receive the very best of service, despite the very welcome increasing workload. So her business now supports her whole family. Her intention is to keep developing her business locally and further afield and growing her family of satisfied clients. 

Katie has also managed to grow a family of her own, producing two children during the infancy and expansion of her conceptual design business – a feat which certainly deserves a mention here.