Katie Grand: Editor-in-Chief of Love Mag and Pudsey 2012 Curator (With Balenciaga Bear No. 3)

Grazia Daily: How did you become involved in the Pudsey Bear 2012 Project for BBC’s Children in Need?

Katie Grand: Angelo Pennetta was doing the portraits for the designers and their bears, and asked if I could get Louis Vuitton to do it. They usually don’t doing anything out of house, but they were very up for it. I worked with Kim Jones (style director of Louis Vuitton) on a bear that auctioned at £36,000 for the charity. After that [the BBC] asked if I could curate!

Grazia Daily: How has this collaboration differed from other collaborations you’ve done in the past?

Katie Grand: It doesn’t really. Because I’ve done various pop-ups in the past, I’m used to calling places like Prada and asking for participation in things. But they don’t get often asked to do these kind of things, so it was very easy.

Grazia Daily: Well it’s so unique and personal…

Katie Grand: And cute! I couldn’t believe it when Balenciaga said yes, and to five bears!

Grazia Daily: What challenges did you face as the curator of the collaboration?

Katie Grand: There weren’t many major challenges, it was pretty straight-forward.

Grazia Daily: That was lucky! That doesn’t happen all the time…

Katie Grand: Yeah! There are no notorious stories of anything being difficult.

Grazia Daily: Pudsey is so iconic, what was your curating concept in balancing the icon with these aesthetically fresh designers?

Katie Grand: Explaining the idea of Pudsey to Italian fashion companies was quite interesting! You know, explaining that we’re sending them a pattern and they can do whatever they want. I just said it should be super iconic to each brand – that was the only briefing I really gave. But it’s great they were allowed to be so creative, so different. They really got quite competitive.

Grazia Daily: Did you have a favourite teddy growing up?

Katie Grand: Oh, Fozzie Bear for me. Yeah, any kind of Muppet, but Fozzie was the best.