I'm Kato — Creative Director and Illustrator based in Riga.
I work with brands that need more than nice-looking illustrations. What they usually need is a visual language — something that holds together across a product, a campaign, and everything in between. That's what I build: illustration systems that are both strategically grounded and made by hand.
- I lead the creative direction and do the craft myself.
This matters in practice: I'm in the strategic conversations and at the desk drawing — which means things stay coherent from brief to final asset. I work closely with internal teams and agency partners, and I always make sure the deliverable is something your team can actually use after the project ends. Working together tends to feel calm and collaborative. I ask a lot of questions at the start so there are fewer surprises at the end.
My path to this work was a little roundabout — linguistics, art history, a decade in brand and communications before I committed fully to illustration and creative direction. In 2024, I completed Brand Strategy & Design at Central Saint Martins.
Honestly, none of it feels like a detour now. Understanding how language works made me better at visual narrative. Knowing how brands are built made systems thinking feel natural. And the linguistics degree still occasionally surprises people at client meetings.
If you're working on something where visual consistency really matters — across scale, across channels, across time — I'd love to hear about it.
kato@heykato.studio
Selected Clients
From global brands to growing startups and local initiatives, I bring the same energy to every project. But okay, let me have my namedropping moment.
