About
Ellen McKenna is a Melbourne based surface pattern designer and artist.
Ellen McKenna is a Melbourne based surface pattern designer, artist and interiors consultant. Ellen uses her art and pattern work as creative expression with a focus on colour, shape, playfulness and balance. Inspired by multidisciplinary design elements from the early to mid 20th Century, Ellen’s aesthetic is also shaped by her lifelong study and love of the arts which includes, a Certificate IV in Design, a Certificate IV in Interior Decorating and graduating with a degree in Visual and Performing Arts from the Victorian College of the Arts.
Ellen's design work has, so far, been featured in products by fashion, textile and home wares clients, such as Gillian Valentine, Natty and Polly, Sole Mio, Kablooie, Elm Lifestyle , Chester Street Clothing, Foxwood Clothing, Tokoencit, Little and Kind, Nerida Hansen Textiles, Cotton ON, Soxy Beast and a collaboration with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra.
Ellen also produced a month long exhibition 'Feeling Colours’ which was hosted by the Bluethumb Art Gallery and was part of Melbourne Design Week NGV and featured Ellen’s art and textile design.
Ellen was also shortlisted as a finalist and awarded a commendation in The Design Files + Laminex - Design Awards in the category of Textile Design.
Ellen's art work has also been featured in Home Design Magazine and has been included in a corporate art acquisition for the Queen and Collins Building in Melbourne.
Ellen works in both digital and painterly repeat pattern design and also standalone canvas and scalable digital placement art.
Selected Projects and Highlights
2024 We Dream in Colour Exhibition
2023 Colour Spectrum Exhibition
2021 Feeling Colours - Solo Exhibition for Melbourne Design Week NGV
2020 The Design Files Awards - Commendation
2020 The Design Files Awards - Finalist
2020 From Art To Fashion - Solo Exhibition, Town Hall Gallery , Hawthorn
