Katja Handt (Kattasche)
Maker Member
Mixed Media
Katja is a multidisciplinary designer and artist based on Dharawal Country in the Illawarra, NSW. With a background in set and costume design (BA Hons Theatre Design, Central Saint Martin’s College London), her practice spans theatre, film and visual arts, unified by a deep commitment to storytelling and architectural and material exploration. Her artistic work often sits at the intersection of object, body and space, blurring the lines between installation and performance.Â
She is the founder of Kattasche [Kat for Katja +  tasche, the German work for bag], a small atelier for leatherwork in Port Kembla. Katja fell in love with leather as a working material whilst making belts and armour for the Narnian Navy and George Miller’s War Boys. In 2020, assisted by a grant from Create NSW, she up-skilled in traditional French leather craft and transformed her material practice into a studio for bespoke leather goods. Kattasche brings together her desire for creating with her hands; her sensibilities as a costume designer when she co-creates a bespoke bag with a client; and her passion for sustaining our beautiful planet and heritage crafts.
Her leatherwork has been stocked at the Australian Design Centre, Courtesy of the Artist in Sydney's Strand Arcade and she has been a stall holder at Handmade Canberra, The Makers and Shakers, The Big Design Market, Finders Keepers and at Bundanon Makers Market. This year is she excited to show her work at Undercurrent in Canberra for the first time.
She is a casual lecturer at UOW (Installation Design) and just received a small cultural grant from Wollongong Council to assist with the purchase of additional tools for leather craft classes.
"I am a Wollongong-based designer, artist, and founder of Kattasche, a leatherwork studio in Port Kembla. Across a career spanning more than 25 years in the performing and visual arts, I have worked with a wide range of materials as both designer and maker, but leather has become the most compelling and rewarding of them all.
I am deeply passionate about this centuries-old heritage craft and committed to elevating leather as a recognised artistic and craft material—one that is often overlooked or omitted entirely from contemporary material conversations.
Like many traditional crafts, leatherwork is slowly disappearing, while the industry itself suffers from widespread misinformation and the consequences of fast fashion. Connected practices, such as responsible tanning, are also increasingly at risk of being lost.
Leather is a natural by-product of the meat industry and has been part of human making for as long as we have consumed meat. Over time, it has evolved into one of our most versatile materials: it can be moulded, dyed, stitched, laced, softened or hardened, transformed into garment or object, and at the end of its life, returned to the earth through compost.
My practice is driven by a commitment to preserving traditional leatherworking methods and sharing these skills with others. At the same time, I am pushing the material into new territory—experimenting with leather in expanded and unconventional ways to bring it further into contemporary art practice."
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Online Resources:
Website: https://www.kattasche.com/
Instagram: @kattasche
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