Hello! Kato here, LA's token Brit of four years.

I've been drawing and illustrating since I could hold a pencil and began desiging clothing when I was 11 but wasn't satisfied that I was worthy of the title "clothing designer" until I'd mastered sewing just a couple of years ago.

I bagged the name SteampunkCouture in May 2005 after a friend introduced me to the term "steampunk" when describing the way I dressed and my style of illustration and modeling shoots. In just over a year since I began offering custom clothing to people, I'd designed and created over 400 peices. My confession is that the commissions I received were actually my sewing practice, and the more that came in, the better I became. It's a miracle that I never had a disatisfied customer.

I offer custom, made-to-measure clothing and accessories over at steampunkcouture.com but find that Etsy makes it easier for me to create and sell one-of-a-kind items of which are added regularly, so keep checking in on me at [link]

I don't have any longing to become some big-name fashion designer with a whole team, runway shows and whopping price tags. It's been a rough journey to get to the point where I LOVE what I do for a living, so I'm happy to spend the rest of my life doing this. 'Though with that said, with every purchase or custom commission I receive, I'm closer to being able to buy my first house and have a bigger studio, which means newer, better work is on the horizon!

Life is about creating and following your dreams. If you ruthlessly pursue that which you feel most passionately about, you'll find that doors will coincidentally open for you.