The Studio

Wraparound Style

Seventies style celebrated the elegance of the wrap. Diane von Furstenburg launched her classic wrap dress, bohemian lasses wore long flowy wraparound skirts to Grateful Dead shows, and my high school-aged sister lived in her Indian cotton wrap skirt when she wasn’t in her school uniform. Wraparounds are my favorite wardrobe staple. I love their…

English In Action

The women of English In Action. From left to right standing: Angela, Lara, Shinta, Paulina, Manuela and sitting: Rachel, Heather, Susannah. “A small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” Margaret Mead The women of English in Action. The Roaring Fork Valley of Colorado is a…

Peony in Blue: Design Story

Luna amongst my peony hedge. Peonies are easy to fall for. These legendary perennials look high maintenance but are quite the opposite, although they require plenty of compost, attention to staking, and the basics of water and light. The plants thrive in our cool high alpine climate and have naturalized throughout my garden. When our…

Making the List

Our studio director Jennifer Roberts on the story behind our bestselling List-It notebooks Our monkey king list it notebook. 1. The Inspiration My mother’s singular list-making habit was the initial inspiration for my List-it notebook design. Her lists are a marvel. I would stumble on them all over our house– on a desk, the kitchen…

Ode to Joy – Design Story:

Our Ode to Joy prints. Years ago my daughter’s interest in mathematics inspired me to translate numbers into a color algorithm. I assigned colors to digits and charted out irrational numbers like Pi and Euler’s and found not only patterns but also a certain cadence within the string of numbers.  I thought I could apply…

Free Bird – Design Story: Appreciating the Overhead

The birds still remember what we have forgotten, that the world is meant to be celebrated.” –Terry Tempest Williams https://isacatto.com/product-tag/plover/piping plover A small animation of our piping plover doing what it does best: running across the sands of the Great Lakes. I was an avid bird watcher as a child. I spent hours with the Audubon…

The Release: The Story Behind the Painting

The Release Singer Editions Print A rabbit image for the beginning of February. And the story to go with it. When I was pregnant with our oldest, I wanted to take a class before motherhood became all-consuming, so I signed up for an introduction to mixed media workshop with the sublime artist Roy Dowell at…

Team Players

All the team except for Jennifer and Vivian. The studio team is officially on vacation and I’m the last one standing. Isa Catto Studio definitely earned a break after a surprisingly busy season with online sales and growing wholesale accounts. When I started this business a little over a year ago, I was flying blind.…

Small Business Saturday

Some thoughts on our country of small businesses for today, November 28th, Small Business Saturday. It wasn’t until I was preparing to open my dream, a small shop filled with modern home and work goods that I became fully aware, we are a country of small businesses. My family was a mix of engineers and…

How to gift wrap a telescoping box

What is a telescoping box? A telescoping box is simply a two-piece box– there is a compartment to place your items and a separate lid. It’s that simple. And, sure, you can place your gift inside, close the lid and wrap it up. But where’s the fun, or the challenge in that? So, this is…