GOSIA PIATEK
Kowtow
The notion of Wellington being a great place to hunker down is a recurring theme. For Gosia Piatek, founder and creative director of Kowtow, it’s what keeps her here – for six months of the year, at least. “My partner is in London so I spend half my time there,” she explains. “And it’s full on. I like that in Wellington there’s less pressure to keep up with what’s cool or what’s in, you can just concentrate on your own stuff.”
Not that Gosia doesn’t have her finger on the pulse – quite the opposite. When she started Kowtow with her ex-partner nine years ago, its staple offerings were loud T-shirts “with really offensive designs”, she says. But “fashion changed”, so she created a capsule collection of simple, monochrome pieces in a luxurious, cotton-jersey fabric. “We immediately lost all our stockists,” she tells me. “They were like, ‘where is the colour, where are the prints?’” But when the range was picked up by Fabric in Auckland, and positioned alongside brands including Isabel Marant and Comme des Garçons, other high-end retailers came knocking.
Since then, Kowtow has gone from strength to strength internationally and locally. The brand is stocked everywhere from New York to Copenhagen and Gosia now has her sights set on Tokyo. Fourteen staff work from a spacious workroom on Wakefield Street, and with
plans to hire more staff, she says they’ve almost outgrown the space they moved into less than two years ago.
With its Scandi-meets-Kiwi aesthetic and fair-trade, ethically and sustainably produced organic cotton designs (such buzzwords these days that Gosia tends to downplay them), Kowtow appeals to a broad crosssection of consumers. “I’m Polish and Polish people are really eager to please, which is probably why I’ve created this thing that works across so many different markets.” Gosia also attributes her formidable work ethic to her Polish roots, but as driven as she is, she insists she’s very much a ‘lifestyle’ person. “There’s got to be a reason why you’re doing it all,” she says. “And it can’t just be work.” Gosia lives at the edge of a marine reserve on Wellington’s south coast and recently watched a pod of dolphins from her window. “That’s a sight you don’t get sick of,” she says. But while she loves the local landscape, she confesses that what’s happening overseas inspires her more than what’s going on here. “Thanks to the internet we live in this world where our actual location is irrelevant.”
One thing Gosia does love about the city is that there’s only one hub. “Everything is two minutes away,” she says, as we walk across the road to Nikau Café at the City Gallery (which, incidentally, has been on everyone else’s ‘must-visit’ list this week). She rates the team at Nikau because “they’re real foodies” but having worked for them as a teenager, she’s only just started coming back. “I used to turn up for my shifts so hungover,” she remembers. “So for the longest time I avoided the place thinking they must hate me. I came here once for a birthday party and was literally hiding behind my hair and my friend was like, ‘they don’t give a shit, it’s been 10 years!’”
Also nearby is Good as Gold, where Kowtow sells well, so I ask the manager, Israel Elkington, why that is. “It appeals to a very broad demographic. From students, to outof-towners, to the cool, older, Iris Apfel type,” he says. I ask Gosia how long Good as Gold has been a part of the Kowtow story. “Oh, they’ve stocked me forever,” she laughs. “Since way back when I was weird!”
“I’m Polish and Polish people are really eager to please, which is probably why I’ve created this thing that works across so many
different markets”