Since we last caught up with Phoebe Kut in June 2024, she’s signed her first publishing deal (for the Little Book of Interior Styles, coming Spring 2027), been featured in Architectural Digest, and added a host of new brand collaborations to her portfolio.
In this, our second in-depth feature on Phoebe’s work, we dive into how her unique brand of edutainment expanded in scope from a very popular series across Instagram and TikTok to the book medium, and how she landed a publishing deal with Abrams Books with no connections in the industry.
Birth of an Idea
For years now, Phoebe has created short illustration videos that have racked up tens of millions of views across Instagram and TikTok: each video showcases a different iconic piece of furniture, and the concept proved so popular that many of her brand collaborations feature the same format extended to perfume bottles, accessories, and shoes.
In the drawing videos of the furniture I always call it ‘edutainment’, little bite size pieces of information you’d learn about the chair while I draw it.
As the popularity of her drawing videos grew, many of Phoebe’s friends started asking her for advice about choosing the right pieces for their apartments and houses, and the millions who watched her content took interior design inspiration from the edutainment she provided. In January 2024, she floated the idea of creating a coloring book, and her online audience responded positively.
Soon after, Phoebe created a proposal and sent it to publishers, but she had no luck. The initial setback was a little daunting; it seemed like the book idea was over before it had even begun.
Perseverance: the Architectural Digest Feature
In December 2024, Architectural Digest featured Phoebe’s work. The article speaks about how she transformed a 330 square foot rental apartment in NYC on a $5,000 budget.
The AD article covers an aspect of Phoebe’s work that has many similarities with her overall interior design, illustration, and content creation practices: she is able to create a lot out of a little, she loves a challenge, and she brings her sense of elegance and timelessness to constrained projects, whether by budget or space.
It also showcases many of her skills that the 325,000+ people who follow her on social media might not know about: her resourcefulness, her deep knowledge of interior design principles and color, and her ability to make furniture elements work in harmony with their surroundings.
Specifically, she chose multiple dual-purpose items that optimize the use of space in the relatively small apartment, including a sofa/twin bed and a piano/entryway console. Phoebe also replaced several items of furniture and fittings with elements that were more in tune with the century-old brick-and-wood retro charm of the rental.
The article was a dream come true for Phoebe, one that simultaneously showcased her work while adding a further layer of prestige to her interior design practice. And it was to help her fulfill her book publishing dream in the most serendipitous of ways.
Leigh, a literary agent, reached out to Phoebe after reading the AD article, with a proposal to collaborate on getting a book published.
The Little Book of Interior Styles
To Phoebe, being approached by Leigh was confirmation of something she’d always lived by and believed in: that one should keep putting oneself out there, even after initial setbacks, because things often work out with the right timing and a little bit of luck.
Phoebe and Leigh worked together on a proposal between January and April 2025. In June 2025, they had multiple author-editor meetings.
In July 2025, auction day happened. After six months of preparation, Phoebe was nervous but confident. As the offers from different publishers came in throughout the day, her excitement grew: her dream was almost a reality.
At the end of the auction day in July 2025, Phoebe accepted an offer from Abrams Books. She had her first book deal.
The Little Book of Interior Styles by Phoebe Kut takes her edutainment brand to the printed page, covering different interior styles and periods from design history through iconic pieces of furniture associated with those styles and periods.
Looking Back on the Process: a Dream Come True
The book medium will bridge the gap between social, which lives online, to something tangible and that can be a keepsake, which relates back to my love for interior design. I want the book to be something timeless, gifty, tactile, informative and also a beautiful object that will live in people’s homes.
The Little Book of Interior Styles will be engaging and informative. Phoebe hopes that it will make its readers feel like she does every time she picks up one of her two favorite design books: The Interior Design Handbook: Furnish, Decorate, and Style your Space by Frida Ramstedt, and 1000 Chairs by Charlotte and Peter Fiell.
The journey wasn’t always easy, however; during the nine month journey before she was able to announce it to the world, Phoebe learned patience, and to be able to reframe anything seemingly negative as a positive. For example, book publishing is still a traditional industry and things work slowly. Even though the deal was closed in July 2025, it still took till September to sign the official agreements. This was occasionally frustrating, because Phoebe wanted to make sure that everything was 100% officially signed before celebrating.
She also had to contact several legacy design companies during her research work. Her reframing skills helped here: this portion of her work was definitely tedious, but she has also been able to learn more about how copyright and permissions work, knowledge that will stand her in good stead in the long run. Many days during the project have seemed slow and lonely, where she works by herself, but that is balanced by the amount of success that the book project has achieved in less than a year.
Phoebe is very grateful to Leigh, her agent, Soyolmaa, the editor at Abrams, and the entire team at Abrams Books for believing in the project. She is also, as always, deeply thankful to her friends and family whom she leaned on for ideas and endless support.
The Little Book of Interior Styles will hit shelves in Spring 2027; follow the pbjdesign Instagram page for updates and pre-order links closer to the publication date. Phoebe can’t wait to share her first book with the world, and to meet interior design enthusiasts in person during book tour events.
Brand Collaborations
In our earlier piece, we wrote about Phoebe’s collaborations on major campaigns with brands like Samsung, Starbucks, Cadillac Canada, Havoc (from PepsiCo), Daniel Wellington, Axel Arigato, Pull&Bear, and Mugler. She has continued to use her unique blend of illustration, narration, and education to support innovative campaigns:
I love that my work lets me play in both worlds: drawing fun lifestyle products like UGGs while also partnering with legacy design companies with such a rich history in furniture design.
UGG: Continued Illustration Collaboration
Phoebe created an illustration for UGG’s Spring 2025 campaign supporting the Bea Mary Jane.
Phoebe’s viral UGG reel, with more than one million impressions across platforms, and over ten thousand likes on Instagram alone, is as remarkable for the parts of the illustration process which it does not show as for those which it does.
For example, the – no doubt painstaking – stages of the creation of the drawing of the twin seam and overstitched binding aren’t seen; they appear like magic: solid, intricate, holding everything together.
This reflects the technical marvels behind, and within, the Bea Mary Jane; as with other UGG products, we often lose ourselves in the comfort and chunky elegance of the visual artistry, while the craft that holds them together does its quiet work in the background.
The end result has the same quality that all of Phoebe’s video shorts documenting her illustrations do: it is simultaneously audio ASMR, a visual treat, an educational journey, and really strong promotion for UGG, without ever feeling like promotion in any way.
I’m excited to be collaborating with a brand again – it’s always affirming to see my work align with their audience and to know it resonates with people. UGG has been especially innovative with both their designs and campaigns, and I’m thrilled to be part of their upcoming Fall 2025/Winter 2026 launches.
Fans of Phoebe’s ongoing collaboration with UGG can look forward to more short videos showcasing her new illustrations for the brand, including two highlight Fall/Winter 2025 launches: the Zora Ballet Flat and Fluff Momma. The videos will launch on UGG’s official Instagram, TikTok, and other social channels.
Humanscale Collaboration: Diffrient Lounge Chair
One of Phoebe’s first collaborations was with Humanscale; they worked together in 2024 as the brand retooled its marketing strategy, celebrating the 25th anniversary of the iconic Freedom Chair.
She is very excited to work with them again in Fall/Winter 2026 to add her illustration and content creation magic to their spotlight on the Diffrient Lounge Chair. Fans can look forward to the launch on Humanscale’s social media pages. Phoebe’s work on this project isn’t just confined to illustration; she will use her social media expertise to create strategic content to showcase Diffrient online and offline and help connect it with a new audience.
Phoebe continues to work on residential interior projects, and is excited about partnering with Lenovo on their launch of the Yoga 9i, through a campaign that spotlights creatives.
Links
Phoebe Kut (pbjdesign) – Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pbjdesign_/.
Phoebe Kut (pbjdesign) – TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@pbjdesign.
Phoebe Kut (pbjdesign) – YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@pbjofficial/.
Etsy page: https://etsy.com/ca/shop/pbjdesignshop.
Phoebe Kut (pbjdesign) – Artists Are Cool Feature Part 1 (June 2024): https://artistsarecool.com/phoebe-kut-pbjdesign-illustration-interior-design/.