Keita Turner, guest designer for the ESSENCE SHOWHOUSE, is president of KT Design Solutions, which she founded in 2000. Its mission: to create safe, orderly havens and high-end residential and commercial environments that are clean and functional, warm and inviting, suitable and inspirational, and, most importantly, uplift the human spirit. Although she does not subscribe to a particular style, Keita enjoys creating eclectic, visually stimulating interiors that mix high-quality contemporary pieces and fabrics with antiques and architectural pieces.
She graduated from the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design in 1991 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Apparel Design, established herself as a successful fashion designer in New York, then made the transition to interior design at the School of Visual Arts. After working on both residential and commercial projects for the Interior Design firm of Betty R. Turner Interiors in St. Louis, she started her own interior design firm.
Keita’s current commercial projects include an office renovation for a midtown venture capital firm and the completed interior build-out of Harlem Vintage—a wine retail boutique in upper Manhattan. She recently completed the interior design of display townhomes for the "1400 On 5th Avenue" "green" project. Keita has handled a wide variety of residential projects, from a Tribeca apartment to a politician’s Washington, D.C. home, and is gaining popularity among New York’s Wall Street executives, investment bankers, fashion models, entrepreneurs, real estate developers and other professionals.
Keita was the production designer for the award-winning dramatic comedy film Vivan, released in 2002, and recently completed production on the film, Revolving Door, to be released in late 2005. She was invited to design the 2003 Abyssinian Development Corporation and Citibank-sponsored Show House called "Astor Row, Then and Now". Keita has been invited as a member of and had her interior design work accepted for inclusion in the African American Design Archive (AADA) at the prestigious Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum in 2004.
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