Charlotte, North Carolina · Founded by Gabrielle Amato & Carolyn Hakansson
Gabrielle Amato and Carolyn Hakansson met as fashion industry interns in New York City in 2013, bonded instantly over design, dinner parties, and beautifully set tables, and spent the next decade watching their careers and their lives get bigger and more complicated. One was five months postpartum. The other had just stepped into a demanding new role. Both were desperate for a way to entertain beautifully without the stress. Table Two Studio is what they built in Charlotte -- design-forward paper plates and hosting essentials approached exactly like a fashion collection: layered, directional, full of personality.
Some brands are born from a gap in the market. Table Two Studio was born from a season of life. Gabrielle Amato and Carolyn Hakansson met as interns in New York City in 2013 -- both working in fashion, both immediately recognizing in each other the same love of design, aesthetics, and the art of a beautifully set table. They built a decade-long friendship over dinner parties and shared taste before the idea of a brand finally crystallized.
It happened during one of the hardest, most joyful, most chaotic stretches of both their lives. Gabby was five months postpartum, trying to find ways to host beautifully without the weight of endless dishes and storage. Carolyn was an art director living in a small New York apartment, design-obsessed but lacking the space for multiple sets of tableware for different occasions. The solution didn't exist in the market -- so they built it.
Table Two Studio designs elevated paper plates and hosting essentials in Charlotte, North Carolina, approaching each collection the way a fashion brand approaches a season: mixing textures and tones, balancing statement pieces with everyday staples, translating what's current in fashion into something tangible for the table. Their featured artist Katharine Reynolds -- Gabby's childhood friend -- hand-paints the designs that become the brand's signature pieces. On a registry, Table Two Studio is the entertaining category for the couple who hosts constantly and wants every gathering, however spontaneous, to feel like it was thought about.
