{"id":5844,"date":"2026-04-21T12:43:52","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T19:43:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/colleges.claremont.edu\/thehive\/?p=5844"},"modified":"2026-04-21T12:46:28","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T19:46:28","slug":"profiles-in-impact-keath-carter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/colleges.claremont.edu\/thehive\/profiles-in-impact-keath-carter\/","title":{"rendered":"Profiles In Impact: Keath Carter"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As a first-year at Pomona, Keath took <\/span><\/i>Introduction to Human-Centered Design<\/span> in the spring of 2019, and followed it up with<\/span><\/i> Advanced Human-Centered Design<\/span> that fall. When the pandemic hit in 2020, Keath stepped away from school for several years to launch his own fashion line\u2014before returning to Pomona in the fall of 2025 to complete his degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

\n

How I broke into the fashion world was like this: I snuck into a Kanye West listening party, guessed his shoe size, and gave him a prototype of the sandals I was working on. Two days later, he wore them to this black-tie <\/span>GQ Magazine<\/span><\/i> event, where he broke the dress code: black tux jacket, khaki pants, and my sandals.<\/span><\/p>\n

I used the pics on social media and got my first wave of sales. I remember seeing the Shopify deposit hit my account and thinking, <\/span>Okay, maybe this is real. Maybe now I can actually afford to live in SoCal.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

That was my break. The part before that was the Hive.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019d come to Pomona from Chicago as a Philosophy, Politics, and Economics major, and I found the Hive almost by accident. I thought design was about what looks good and feels fresh: creating things you think are beautiful.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The Hive broke that open. Fred pushed me to see that design isn\u2019t about handing people your idea of what\u2019s right. It\u2019s about getting out of your own head and seeing what\u2019s actually going on with them. One of my first projects focused on parking signs in L.A. They drove me crazy. You\u2019d get ticketed and think:<\/span> Maybe I technically broke the rules, but the real problem is how impossible the signs are to read. <\/span><\/i>At first, I created a policy recommendation. But then I realized that nobody looks at a policy paper. So I turned it into a rubric that people in city government could use to evaluate signs: <\/span>Are they clear and concise, do they work for all the Spanish speakers in the neighborhood? <\/span><\/i>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

But even a rubric is overlookable. So I tried to imagine the scenario where people would be discussing street signs. They\u2019re sitting around a table, and after a while, they get thirsty. And they reach to take that sip, and glance at their coaster\u2026so that\u2019s where I put my rubric. And I broke it down, so each coaster got a different line from the rubric\u2014to give each person one value to keep an eye on\u2014which then sets up the people around the table to work as a team.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then the pandemic hit, and they closed all the campuses. And I didn\u2019t want to go back home to Chicago, because I\u2019d fallen in love with Southern California. So I framed it as a design challenge: <\/span>All right, Keath, how might you design a sustainable life in SoCal? <\/span><\/i>And I followed the process I\u2019d learned: <\/span>start by empathizing<\/span><\/i>\u2014which in this case, meant looking hard at myself. What do I love? What am I good at? Fashion started to emerge as the direction. But not just making cool clothes. I had to make money at it.<\/span><\/p>\n

You\u2019ve got to go past<\/span> Do I like this idea?<\/span><\/i> to <\/span>What do people really need? <\/span><\/i>Past \u201cfashion as making cool stuff\u201d to \u201cfashion as a business.\u201d When I co-founded Verrochio\u2019s Workshop, I took the factory relationships I\u2019d built, and started using them to help other people make things\u2014T-shirts and other goods for companies like Sony, Warner Brothers, and even Vanguard. But I was never going to win against the big manufacturers who can get you the cheapest swag. My value proposition was: I am a designer who can help you bridge the gap between your customers and their unmet needs. So when Lumicera wanted to give their people a gift to celebrate their one-millionth sale, they asked me for the usual stuff: branded water bottles and backpacks. If I\u2019d just been a merchandiser, I would\u2019ve written down their order and manufactured a thousand pieces. But I knew a bag full of random stuff wasn\u2019t going to make Lumicera\u2019s employees feel loved. So I started observing how people operated in their offices. And there weren\u2019t many people walking around with plastic water bottles; nobody was wearing a T-shirt. But everybody had these zip-up vests. So I convinced the client to reallocate funds to make something that would show their employees that they\u2019d been <\/span>seen<\/span><\/i>. To create a gift that was an act of caring.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The point is not to empathize because it\u2019s a nice thing to do. Empathy is a tool for learning: it opens us up to the evidence the world gives us. Empathy gives reality a chance to chew on your idea, and point you to the parts you still need to fix.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I developed deep trust with my clients by showing them I wanted to uncover the problems they faced. A lot of my B-school friends gloss over the soft skills. But if you\u2019re the one who cares enough to find out the truth about your customers\u2019 reality, then you get the deal. The things I don\u2019t understand about you are a chance for us to get closer.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

written by Dan Coleman<\/p>\n

published by Salina Mu\u00f1oz<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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