Two designers, one shared obsession.
The Silk Snail started, as the best ideas do, with a slow burn: two designers who met on needlepoint TikTok, then face-to-face at a local needlepoint shop, and never looked back. Somewhere between comparing thread stashes and swapping opinions on the funkiest vintage canvases we could find, we landed on a shared itch — for whimsy, a little edge, unapologetically bright color, and finishes nobody had tried yet (see: a two-sided snake canvas built to become a bag). The name came to Gabrielle mid-conversation, half in jest, and stuck immediately: snails carry their whole home on their back, they’re never in a hurry, and they leave a trail of silk thread wherever they go — which, if you’ve ever lost an afternoon to a good long stitch, sounds like exactly the kind of patience we were after. What started as an offhand “we should just do this together” has turned into canvases sold through some of our favorite shops, with a big assist from our friend Olivia and the whole Guild at Navy Noo — and we’re just getting started.
Kylie
Kylie is the half of The Silk Snail who will spend an hour burrowing through thread piles for the exact right shade before she’ll let a canvas leave the studio. Both she and Gabrielle are designers, though Kylie’s own sensibility leans a little celestial, a tinge witchy. She’s a Texas native with a permanent soft spot for Paris (she studied photography at Parsons Paris and never quite left it behind). A 5th-generation stitcher taught by her mother as a kid, she picked the needle back up a few years ago looking for an excuse to sit with her husband, Justin, and watch trashy reality TV. A self-proclaimed color junkie and thread collector (yes, she’s that girl with the needlepoint closet), she’s known for major color swaps, a weakness for sparkly and variegated fibers, a good bargello, and any excuse for a french knot. Outside the studio, she and Justin are the favorite aunt and uncle to 8 (soon to be 10) littles, and share their home with three cats, Gatsby, Luna, and Baby Cat, and one very good dog, Theodore.
Gabrielle
Gabrielle is the half of The Silk Snail who will absolutely couch a handful of pom-poms onto a fish canvas just to see it bubble in 3D — and then wonder how to outdo herself next time. A forever Texan, wife, and mom to three daughters, she trained in Interior and Product Design at Parsons in New York before a stint as a graphic artist. Needlepoint found her in 2020, when a new baby and a stressful world called for a creative outlet — and it never let go. Six years, one small business, and a growing shelf of experimental fibers later, she’s still chasing the next unconventional technique, running local stitch clubs, and folding old-house charm and vintage paper-goods sensibility into every design, always with a bit of humor stitched in.
We believe needlepoint should be as wild, romantic, and expressive as the hands that create it — never ordinary.