Chats with Zonkt

by Anna Owens March 28, 2018

Chats with Zonkt

Meet Kim. Head Queen at Zonkt and all round ace human. A self taught designer and sewer of groovy gear for kids and adults. Popularly known for her printed leggings #zonkthappypants.

Zonkt Designs leggings in colourful prints

Kim’s creative style beams positive energy with a vibrant and unique twist. I mean how genius is it to write empowering affirmations on the inner waistline of cool kids leggings?! AND to have the tag digitally printed on the waste line too! Yep that tickly tag, is no longer #zonkthappypants. Winning..

To add to this, Zonkt designs incorporate strong hashtags, like #GIRLPOWER #KINDNESS & #LOVE onto fun textile designs. We just HAD to have this incredible print on our wares.

Aside from being super talented in the design space, Kim is a darn right good egg. On a monthly basis, Kim offers free design prints to her audience. How generous is that. You’ll see many of these designs being used by talented creatives and a bunch of them on our head ties and scrunchies.

Three ownsit! scrunchies made using Zonkt designed prints.

Hold UP! We aren’t entirely free loading, because we have licensed two exclusive designs from Zonkt. Our Milkbar Collection print and another seriously beautiful print being released later this year. Ooohhh.

Zonkt offers a range of designs for licensing from non exclusive to exclusive prints in various colour ways that will be sure to satisfy all colour palettes. Once you finish reading our chat with Kim, you should totally pop over to her site and have a play around.

Kim has been growing her business and doing the mum life juggle since 2013. A fierce, self assured woman with plenty of wit. She can also dish up bloody good meme..

Zonkt design quote tiles

So here she is, the great woman herself, Kim - chatting all things Zonkt..

Kim, you are the talented lady behind Zonkt - we’d love to hear more about you?

Ok, well my favorite color is rainbow.

I love a good chinwag, especially over a cuppa.

My family / friends call me Kiki, after my nephew was unable to pronounce Aunty Kimi, some 18yrs ago, it kinda stuck.

I believe exercise is SHOPPING and cleaning the house, opposed to my hubby who lives at the gym. What can I say, he’s the Yin to my Yang. Ha!

I’m completely self taught Creative Designer & know add sewer to that title.

My pre-Zonkt like was 15yrs in Corporate Insurance, saying it’s slight change to my current work life would be an understatement.

I’m a Mum two crazy monkeys, Neva 9 & Eddie 6 & our 12yr old toy poodle Spencer.

What is the meaning behind the name Zonkt?

Zonkt is a variant of the word Zonked meaning exhausted or asleep.

I started Zonkt™ in 2013, following the constant designs, ideas & creations I’d dream up once my head hit the cushion.

This exhausted mamas brain never seems to turn off!

Initially Zonkt started as a design, DIY & food blog as well as a storage solution for kids art. But it wasn’t until I began transforming my art & designs into repeat surface pattern designs that I found my passion. I ABSOLUTELY love how a pattern can start one way, but end entirely differently from how you began, is so enticing to me.

It also exciting to be able to now add seamstress to this list as it’s something I’m a tad proud of. Sewing has never come naturally to me & it’s taken me months to fine tune my skills, but to have my own designs now printed cut & sewn all by me all in Australia, I’m pretty proud of that.

How would you describe your design style?

Oh this is a hard one.

I actually find as an artist it’s hard to think you have one distinctive style.

Mind you, if I can see a pattern & I can usually tell you the artist that made it.

Guess it’s the eyes looking out rather than in.

So I’ll leave that one to your readers, what style would you describe my work?

Where do you draw inspiration from?

Colours mainly.

I could look at colour ways all day, I get excited just looking at sets & what I could create from them.

If I do a graphic based design, a lot of the time these are drawn with people in mind. Or that inspire me. I did a whole design series on Australian Botanicals in memory of my beautiful Nan Betty, her favourite flowers were Australian natives. I loved doing this series as now every time I see it I think of her.

What is your fav Zonkt designs and why does it stand out the most for you?

That’s like asking which child is your favourite. That’s so hard!

I also make so many all the time & get bored easy, so it changes often. Ha!

Off the top of my head...

Yukima as it was my first digitalised painted design I transferred into apparel.

Candy because that colour pop gets me every time.

Pixie I love its somewhat juvenile playfulness.

Betty created in memory of my Nan.

Tilly because my favourite colour is rainbow

Kiki because it was my first hand painted artwork in close to 20yrs (self-named). The original also hangs above my fireplace so I get to see it everyday. A constant reminder of where I began.

Girlpower as it kicked off a new direction for me & was the first design I created from start (design) to finish product (kids leggings) all by hand.

See told you it was too hard to choose, we could be here for days!!! I have loads.

Girl power is the ace textile design on our apparel - whats your message behind this design?

Funnily enough it was a component of a design that actually didn’t make the cut.

I was creating a design for a client & this was one of the many versions that didn’t make the cut.

There can be SO many designs that fall out of a custom design process but they are never wasted in my eyes especially when they are very different to the final design.

I still loved it, as did my daughter & she begged for me to make it into a design for her, a design with some of her favourite things.

So I did & even better created it into my first pair of handmade Kidz leggings.

It was also from this design that I got the idea to include our Girlpower affirmations (#youreawesome) inside the inner waistbands.

I love this feature of our leggings, that little something special to empower & encourage our young girls. Each quote different for each style.

A very uniquely Zonkt feature.

Where can we purchase Zonkt gear?

Currently all my repeat pattern designs & Kidz leggings are available online on the website.

We are currently chatting to small retailers on stocking our Kidz leggings this year. So, if you know a retailer or are yourself a retailer, feel free to get in contact.

What is your favourite colour and why?

I think I’ve answered that about 10 times already, ha!

Rainbow, if you didn’t catch it.

I refuse to accept it’s not a colour ????

Because we love food, what are three foods you couldn’t live without?

I used to blog food & recipes for over 2yrs, so I’m a little obsessed with food to.

I eat most foods, I’m far from fussy. But I’m also lactose intolerant so very thankful of my lacteeze tablets that let me indulge (thank goodness!).

If I had to choose I’d say...

All kinds of Dumplings, chocolate covered liquorice & Coffee... it’s a food group imo, it’s called breakfast ????

Lastly. What’s your fav quote?

I could be profound, quote another artist or something insightful.

But that’s just not me, if you’ve scene any of my insta memes you’ll know that already. Life would be boring if your not laughing, so my fav quotes are those that make me laugh, smile or take the piss, probably also defines my priorities ha! So he’s one of my favs...

“Water is the most important resource. Without it we couldn’t make coffee.”

How great is Kim?! So nice to learn about the creator behind such a fab brand. The waistline affirmations and hashtags stand out as a unique Zonkt feature. Oh and must agree that rainbow is a colour, the best colour actually! Every girl would probably agree that shopping is the best form of exercise :)

So grateful for your time Kim, thanks for being awesome and thanks to you for being awesome reading this post. Hope you loved it. Now pop over to Zonkt.com.au and have a play around over there.

Whatever it is you do own(s)it! and ALWAYS add colour.. x - Anna