Fashion handbag designer Spade found dead
Housekeeper discovers body in apparent suicide
NEW YORK — Kate Spade, a fashion designer known for her sleek handbags, was found hanged in the bedroom of her Park Avenue apartment Tuesday in an apparent suicide, police said. She was 55.
Spade’s body was found by a housekeeper not long after 10 a.m., police said at a news conference. Her husband and business partner Andy Spade was in the apartment at the time.
The police department’s chief of detectives, Dermot Shea, said that while investigators were still in the early stages of their inquiry, evidence including the state of the apartment and the presence of a note pointed to “a tragic suicide.”
It’s not clear how long Spade had been dead. The medical examiner will perform an autopsy.
The couple’s 13-year-old daughter was at school. Shea wouldn’t discuss what was in the note, but law enforcement officials told The Associated Press that, among other things, it contained a message to the teenage girl telling her it was not her fault. The officials were not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. “We are all devastated by today’s tragedy,” her family said in a statement through a spokesman. “We loved Kate dearly and will miss her terribly. We would ask that our privacy be respected as we grieve during this very difficult time.”
A crime scene truck was parked outside their building on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.
The company she founded and later sold, Kate Spade New York, now has over 140 retail shops and outlet stores across the U.S. and more than 175 shops internationally.
Julia Curry, a spokeswoman for the company, said that “Kate will be dearly missed” and “our thoughts are with Andy and the entire Spade family at this time.”