Design KC Magazine's 2025 Design Awards: The Backstory
Design KC Magazine is fast becoming one of the nation’s premier regional interior design shelter magazines. Started by publisher Keith Sauro in 2021, Design KC Magazine highlights the incredible interior design talent that exists in this beautiful Midwest city, full of rolling hills, glorious architecture, home to the Kansas City Chiefs [ who are 13-1 this season so far ! ] and also the part time home of that most famous of couples, Travis & Taylor.
Earlier this year, when I was speaking at the Midwest Design and Furniture Fair about my AILA sink for Thompson, I had a fun, casual early dinner one night with Keith and his editor-in-chief, Andrea Darr [who are both shown below] and several others.
This is me with my AILA sink for Thompson and that’s Keith, on my left, in the small pic in this collage, at the Midwest Design and Furniture Fair this past May.
While at the table, Keith quietly suggested to Andrea that she consider inviting me to be one of their judges for Design KC Magazine’s 2025 Design Awards and Andrea graciously extended the invite to me right there and then and, of course, I said I’d be honored.
Fast forward to this month, December 2024, when the judging took place. There are 27 judges [ you can meet them all on Design KC Magazine’s Instagram feed ] and each group of us were given a link which contained the interior categories we were to judge.
In my case, I judged 4 categories along with Ted Scott, owner of Lincoln, NE based Medallion Custom Homes.
I honestly had no idea of the level of interior design talent in Kansas City until we were sent the link. Most of the entries were off the charts fabulous - it was hard to choose!!
The big awards ceremony, an invitation only event, will be January 26th, 2025 at The Abbott. I’m strongly considering attending, but haven’t made a final decision yet.
One very nice thing that Design KC Magazine did for each of us who gave our time as judges was to create a lovely graphic with our images, [shown below] and they published this along with biographical information about each of us on their own social channels.
This is the information they published about me on their own social channels.
In the several times I’ve been a judge for various competitions over my career, this is the first time that any of the event producers of those competitions have ever given me this type of recognition on their own social channels and I am deeply appreciative.
[ Thank you, Keith and Andrea! ]
One of the wonderful things about Design KC Magazine is that it is not pay to play. In other words, none of the designers featured in their editorial copy are paying to be featured there. The magazine is advertiser supported and is available in both digital and print.
The Kansas City design community comes together for a big party that Keith throws each time a new issue is released in print and that leads to an amazing amount of online publicity for the magazine and those who are featured or advertising within its pages.
Here’s a photo of the cover of their most recent issue, which was shot by the gentleman on the right, Matthew, whom I met while I was in Kansas City at the Midwest Design and Furniture Fair. Matthew is widely regarded as Kansas City’s best interiors photographer.
[ The photo below was taken by SociablySavvy KC ]
I can’t wait to see all of the 2025 Design KC Magazine award winners featured in their April print issue - be watching for it!
You can subscribe to Design KC Magazine and follow them on their social channels on the links at the bottom of this post.
I hope you will get to know the designers in this wonderfully talented Midwest community who don’t tend to get as much national attention as designers on the East and West coasts.
A few who have gone out of their way to be supportive of me?
Will Brown Interiors, @willbrowninteriors , and one of my past clients, Hong Anh Sievert, @blossomspaces . It was Will who introduced me to the owners of the Midwest Design and Furniture Fair while we were all at HPMKT in the Fall of 2023, which was what led them to hire me to be one of their keynote speakers at MWDAFF this past May.
Hong, who has long been THE mover and shaker bringing the KC design community together through the various events she hosts or helps to host, made time to treat me to a lovely breakfast, even though she was extremely busy with working her own exhibition space at MWDAFF.
In addition, my good friend, Richelle Plett, [ @rlpinteriors ] went out of her way to help me feel welcomed when I visited Kansas City in May by taking me for a day tour around the city and showing me the architectural and design highlights + we had terrific barbeque - a treat that KC is known for!
Last but not least, the very funny and talented Jennifer Bertrand, @jenniferbertranddesign, [ winner of Season 3 of HGTV’s Design Star ] gave me a ride to the dinner that we attended that led to this invitation to be a judge.
I loved learning more about all she does for her special needs son, Winston. What a big heart she has. Jennifer, if you see this, you’re amazing and thank you!
Lastly, I want to thank all of the people in this image below, all from the Kansas City design community, who made the time to come to the unveiling of my AILA sink for Thompson this past February at the National Kitchen and Bath Show in Las Vegas.
These are my people.
In the top image, Irina and Zach Akhmedov, owners of the MWDAFF tradeshow, and Will Brown. Are you noticing Will’s fabulous jacket and how close the color is to Pantone’s 2025 Color Of The Year, Mocha Mousse? Will is always on point when it comes to sartorial style.
In the bottom part of this image are members of the Kansas City/Nebraska chapter of the NKBA, Sadie Anderson [ President ], Michelle Schneider [ Secretary ], Hong [ next to me on my right ] and one other I don’t immediately recognize. On my left is Emily Cathcart, a K&B designer who has become a wonderful new friend this year, from Bend, OR.
And Andrea, thank you for this wonderful article about my AILA sink that you wrote:
https://mydesignkc.com/creative-type/heritage-future/
Getting to know all of you this year has been a highlight of 2024 for me and I hope that each of you I’ve mentioned has a very successful and personally rewarding 2025.
Thank you for welcoming me like you have, Kansas City design community. I appreciate each of you.
Are you ready to follow Design KC Magazine?
Here are the links:
https://www.instagram.com/designkc_magazine
https://www.facebook.com/designkcmagazine
https://www.linkedin.com/company/designkc-magazine
https://www.threads.net/@designkc_magazine
Get to know Keith better, here.
Get to know Andrea better, here.
Are you ready to subscribe to their 4 beautiful quarterly issues for $35.00/year or give this subscription as a gift?
You can do that here: https://mydesignkc.com/subscribe/
And on that same page, you can subscribe to their free newsletter, for those of you who want to get to know the Kansas City design community even better.
Again, be looking for images of the 2025 Design KC Magazine’s 2025 Award Winners in the April issue of Design KC Magazine and look for the winners on Instagram on January 26th, after the awards ceremony that night on https://www.instagram.com/designkc_magazine.
With Gratitude,
Leslie Carothers, Principal
Savour Partnership
Named One Of The Top 40 Most Inspiring Women In Home
Connect with me here:
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