The After Hours Stylist
Beautiful dahlias are used to style in a scene created by the endlessly creative After Hours Stylist, Kate Williams.
It is 8pm on a Monday evening, and Kate Williams is in her floral shed, styling two stunning Easter creations she will help groups of eager participants to make, at workshops she is running at her beautiful Prebbleton property on the coming weekend
words: Jo Bailey images: Kate Williams
Working late into the night is nothing new for Kate, who truly lives up to her name – the After Hours Stylist. At this time of the year, she is up until around midnight most nights working on creative projects. Then she is back up at 6am, to get ready to head to her day job, managing a Christchurch law firm.
As well as overseeing the design and interior styling of the lovely home Kate and her husband Phil built on a block of bare land they purchased nine years ago, the couple has created acres of spectacular cottage style gardens, with formal elements, and many flowers – including abundant fields of lovely blooms. These are in hot demand at regular ‘pick your own stem’ sessions as people flock to pick their own dahlias, zinnias, cosmos, gladioli and more. Kate also welcomes people to her home for regular floral and interior styling workshops, using foraged bounty from the garden.
Her love for beauty and finding ways to accentuate and celebrate it, combined with her passion for creativity, knows no bounds. Kate is an accomplished artist, who loves getting into her paint studio to work on commissions, and create artworks based on her floral designs. Photography is another passion. Her inspirational and aspirational Instagram page, After Hours Stylist is well worth a visit to see how she brings the strands of her creativity together in beautiful imagery.
Kate’s schedule is punishing, but she is grateful to have married another creative soul who shares her huge drive. “Phil is amazing. He has spent his life creating buildings, designs and inventions, and is always coming up with new business ideas. Over the summer he has done most of the garden work here and I’ve done most of the playing,” she laughs.
Kate says it is not unusual to come home and find Phil has built a recycled structure for the garden, a new wall to use as a backdrop for her photography, or even a flying fox which has become a much-loved addition to their property. “I got home recently to find him on the tractor. He’d created a new paddock for another three acres of garden.”
As the colder weather approaches, the pace will slow a little for Kate and Phil. “A glass of wine together would be nice,” she says.
They both love the process of designing and building something from scratch. In fact they have built seven homes in their 33 years together. Kate says the Prebbleton property is a bit special, and might just keep them in one spot for a while yet. The house was designed by architect, Darren O’Neil, and built in stages. Features include exterior cedar and corrugated iron, with beautiful oak floors and timber trusses inside.
Although Kate has no formal interiors training, she has a brilliant eye, and loves nothing more than styling a room around a special piece, which could be anything from one of her artworks, to some gorgeous linen she has found. “It’s quite hard to define the interior style of the house, but I would say it is almost French Country, come Cape Cod,” she says.
Kate grew up in a creative household, with her pharmacist father, and nurse mother, always working on projects after work. “Mum would create with food and sewing. Dad did up old Buick cars, with Mum doing the upholstery. It wasn’t unusual to find Dad working in the garage at 2am. I definitely get it from them, as well as their love of caring for others. Our house was always full of people.”
The Williams’ house and garden, and Kate’s creative work, have been profiled in many local and national magazines, one of which led to the publication of Kate’s first book, appropriately titled, The After Hours Stylist: Growing, gathering, and creating through the seasons. “When House and Garden photographer, Anna McLeod was here shooting for the feature, she said, ‘you should do a book’. Within an hour, we did our first staging together, talked with publishers over the next few weeks, then worked intensively on the project for 28 weeks to meet the deadline.”
After whittling down the resultant 20,000 images to 600, the result is a beautiful coffee table book, featuring the best of Kate’s styling with flowers, foliage and food, and several recipes. “What I hope to achieve with the book, and also my workshops, is teaching people that you can celebrate in style without it being a big expense – that you can create something unique and special using the things around you.”
The After Hours Stylist: Growing, gathering, and creating through the seasons is available from leading retailers.
