For Kate Grace Bauer, creating art is almost as natural as breathing. Family legend has it that Bauer was an artist from birth. The daughter of an interior designer and a realtor, Bauer had the perfect artistic playgrounds to delve into at a formative age.
“With my mom, her spec room in her design business was like my toy store,” she said. “I could just kind of go in there and just go crazy. This was back in the day where you would actually do a physical presentation for clients with boards and samples and fabrics. Today it’s a lot more digitally based, but this was the analog version of the design world.”
Those early days of creating art using cuttings and castoffs helped shape Bauer’s artistic sensibilities, and her father’s focus on spaces in the world of real estate gave her an appreciation for how to create on a larger scale.
When Bauer and her husband, musician John Michael Rouchell, purchased a house four years ago, Bauer said her worlds collided, and she started designing and redesigning their shared spaces. Together, the creative duo created the Blue Room, a creative suite where they produce everything from sound design to original art.
“It was something that came together especially with the pandemic,” she said. “It really helped curate that entire space, and it made it a really intentional space for being able to step in and feel both creative and expressive, but also really safe and like you are sort of being hugged, in a way.”
With that space fully formed, Bauer has turned to projects outside of her home. Her goal is to create spaces for artists of all mediums to feel safe and thrive.
“I’m an artist at heart,” she said. The idea of having a space to create was born in high school, Bauer said.
“I went to Sacred Heart, and our art teacher made the art room a safe space for all of us, and for me in particular,” she said. “Anytime I was having a hard time or a hard week, I could always pop in there, and there was always a seat for me.”
Kate Grace Bauer, kategracebauer@gmail.com, kategracebauer.com, @kategracebauer