Cynthia Rowley's Daughter is Getting into the Clothing Game
The first time I met Kit Keenan, she was jumping off a building. It was at a photo shoot for her mother, Cynthia Rowley, and the teen New Yorker was posing, in mid-air, for Lucien Smith. “I wish she was even a little scared,” Rowley told me as we watched the blonde daredevil, who’s “internet famous” for a viral video where she surfs in high heels. “But she keeps asking the crane operator to let her jump from the roof.”
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Now Keenan is 19, and taking a new kind of leap: she’s starting her own fashion line. It’s called KIT and this is how it works: every few weeks, a new mini-cache of clothes will hit her website. Her first drop debuts June 30, with only 150 of each piece available. The micro range includes long-sleeved lace mini dresses and Picnic at Hanging Rock blouses; next up is a line of streetwear.
> Lily Chee in KITKit Keenan / KIT
“I’ve watched how new designers are treated by the [fashion] industry really closely, and I keep seeing the same thing: they get hammered over the head with these crazy limitations about only making what’s expected; they get told ‘stick to your brand!’ all the time," Keenan says. "I think it’s killing them. Meanwhile, fast fashion is so huge, even though it’s not even that cheap anymore, because it’s constantly evolving and changing, and it’s always aware of what young people want to buy.” According to Keenan, Gen Z shopping style doesn’t have its own brand yet, “because the way we shop, it’s like, one day I’m at Reformation and the next day I want Supreme. As a designer, I have to keep evolving with that pulse.”
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Keenan began sewing as a child; by age 10, she was scavenging scraps at her mom’s studio for bags, tees, and shorts. “In high school, I pushed fashion away a lot because I didn’t want to do what my mom does,” she says. “But you can’t run away from something forever if you really love it. And fashion is something that inspires me. Now, I look at having my mom more as a privilege. She started from nothing and now she’s like a walking handbook for the industry. If I have a question about factory orders, or what needs to be in a sketch, why shouldn’t I ask her? But the actual designs… I mean… I follow my own voice on that.”
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> Lily Chee in KITKit Keenan / KIT
She’s also using her style squad as guinea pigs. “My friends are all really supportive,” says Keenan, citing emerging pop singer Charlotte Lawrence as a personal bestie. “My mom and her mom [the actress Christa Miller] were best friends like 20 years ago. Once I started USC this year, she was the one person I knew in California—and she turned out to be the best person! She’s so driven and passionate, and so focused on her goals as a singer… I like to show her the clothes right after I’ve [designed] them.” Another of Keenan’s muses—YouTube starlet Lily Chee—appears in KIT’s first-ever look book, while artist Richard Prince, gets a shout-out in her logo tees. “He used my photo for one of his Instagram Series paintings,” Kit explains, “And then he tweeted, ‘Someone please rip off my art.’ I was like, ‘Well, okay, I mean, you already ripped off my Instagram, so, done!’”
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Keenan’s quick to acknowledge her social circles are a little... heightened. Raised in downtown New York by Rowley and art curator Bill Powers, she was exposed to urbane life—runway shows, museum galas, fake IDs—like an IRL Serena Van Der Woodsen. She appeared in Jay-Z's video for Picasso Baby; she's the close-up face on NERD's album art for No One Ever Really Dies. Though she’s no stranger to a good party, Keenan is also big on sleep and self-reflection. “People tell me I’m an old soul, because I’ve always gotten along with adults. But more than that, I’ve always been a grandma. I don’t like going out that much. I like working, and I like cooking. Even as a child, I didn’t need a bedtime because I would say, ‘Mommy, I’m tired. I’m going to my room; goodnight!’” Keenan says she hasn’t changed. “I love college, but there are people who never leave school, who only go to frat parties, and who pretend they’re not even in Los Angeles! That’s not what I’m doing… I really like my friends to have goals and jobs.”
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> Lily Chee for KITKit Keenan / KIT
Right now, Keenan’s goals are squarely focused on launching the new range—though a mantra from her mom is making it a little less daunting. “Fake it till you make it! She still says that all the time. And it’s SO true. I’ll be super stressed out. I want everything to be so perfect. And she’s like, ‘Try your best and make it work. If you act confidently, nobody will question it.’ So that’s my motto right now. That and ‘Keep It Together,’ obviously—it spells 'Kit' but it's also funny, because keeping it together is exactly what I’m not doing.”
