It all started with a mug.
Social media influencer Wendy Lau has transformed her longstanding love of Rae Dunn ceramic mugs, a love she has shared with her followers on Kwendy Home for more than a decade, into a brand-new seasonal ceramic line of her own that launched at HomeGoods earlier this month.
But first, the mugs.
Ten years ago, back when she was on a “shoestring budget,” Lau said she dropped by HomeGoods around Thanksgiving time and came across a pair of chunky ceramic mugs with simple, elongated, hand-lettering on them spelling out the words “thankful” and “grateful,” or similar sentiments. They felt really good in the hand. They were the only two on the shelf.
“I had $50 a month at my disposal to spend,” said Lau, “and I chose to spend it on home décor.”
Lau took the mugs home and later discovered that the Rae Dunn design, produced by a tabletop company called Magenta Inc. at the height of the farmhouse craze, was incredibly popular.
“I decided Rae Dunn mugs would be my go-to mugs,” said Lau. “I love the aesthetic. It was so affordable, so accessible.”
Lau started amassing other Rae Dunn ceramics through Facebook Marketplace, and started an account on the site, and on Instagram, to trade info and products with other Rae Dunn aficionados. She is Canadian, and she said it was sometimes hard to find in Canada the products that were available in the United States, so she would ask her community of online friends, ‘Does anyone have a Rae Dunn cookie jar, or a canister or a platter?’
“Facebook Marketplace has a trading, bargaining side to it,” said Lau. “It’s a way to make friends and create community, because we share the same likes. My aesthetic was very much farmhouse.”
Her account later evolved from her passion for collecting ceramics to how she styles a shelf, to her favorite colors and the steps she and her husband, Kwan Chan, took to renovate their home. She renamed her account Kwendy Home, which is an amalgam of her and Chan’s first names. It has more than one million followers.
Her aesthetic is no longer strictly farmhouse. Farmhouse looks were associated with accessible, entry price points that appealed to her when she first became a homeowner, she said. “Now, my look still has those farmhouse roots, with a little cottage core picked up during the pandemic, a little colonial added in.”
Soon Magenta approached her about developing her own line with them that would be sold at HomeGoods and its sister stores.
“Wendy’s community found each other through the love of the treasure hunt that TJX stores is built on, and the desire to create a cozy, comfortable home effortlessly without sacrificing style or your budget,” said Emily Schulze, head of creative at Magenta. “Finding pieces to build into your existing items in your home is what Wendy and her fans love to do. Wendy makes this attainable and gives her fans the confidence that they don’t need to spend a lot of money refreshing their home.
“We wanted to develop an assortment that focuses on the key items that make the biggest impact and change in one’s home without breaking the budget AND giving them the confidence they can curate items. We developed an assortment that signals the season and holiday with a price point that allows this.”
“I don’t know if I would have started my own line if Magenta hadn’t approached me, truth be told,” Lau said. But the chance to work with the same company that first sparked her love for a ceramic mug line was too good to pass up. “I built this aesthetic through Magenta. If you look at my page, I think I have interwoven my DNA with their philosophy,” she said.
“C’mon, when Magenta comes knocking, my goosebumps went up. How exciting is that to be given that opportunity?”
The Kwendy Home by Magenta collection, which debuted in approximately 2,500 HomeGoods, Marshalls and TJMaxx stores this month, is a Halloween launch.
“We love celebrating seasonal things in the house. I thought this was very in line with my life,” Lau said. Although her Instagram account followed her home renovation, Lau said those kinds of wholesale upheaval don’t happen often in a homeowner’s life.
“How do you fall in love with your home again and again?” she asked rhetorically. For her, it was through seasonal décor.
“It feels that seasonal home is not going away anytime soon. Which is why a $5.99 mug is going to take up more space on the retail shelf. It’s this bite-sized piece of joy people can take home.”
Mugs are the hero of her new Halloween collection, and they are modeled after the vintage ceramic villages people collected decades ago.
“We started with a black and white haunted house mug with a lid. It’s whimsical. It’s a hot word in the design world for the past year. I think we’re hitting that.” The haunted house theme crosses into other ceramic accessories like tea-for-one, kitchen canisters, and salt and pepper shakers.
For consumers who are not into the black and white vibe, there’s a second collection based on the moon, stars and mystical oddities in shades of robin’s egg blue and purple. “The colors are there, but it’s not traditionally Halloween,” Lau said.
“We’ve mastered the art of storytelling and whimsy through Wendy’s love for celebrating the season and gathering with friends and family,” said Magenta’s Schulze.
Lau kept details of the collection under wraps socially while developing it, but she said she always discusses design with her followers. “I have a unique position in that I talk to consumers directly,” she said. “When I speak to the Magenta team, I feel I am voicing everyone else’s desires, what they want to see on shelves. … It’s like talking to your girlfriends, it really is.”
New opportunities for Magenta
Magenta’s partnership with Kwendy Home represents an opportunity to evolve tabletop beyond the purely functional into pieces that foster emotional connection and self-expression, Schulze said. “We see growing consumer demand for collections that tell a story, reflect personal style, and create moments of joy in everyday routines.”
It’s the first time Magenta has expanded beyond its licensing model (it is a licensee for Harry Potter and Disney, in addition to Rae Dunn) into the creator economy.
“The partnership with Kwendy reinforces how we see the future of tabletop: products that blend craftsmanship, storytelling and commercial viability,” Schulze said. “By collaborating with creators like Kwendy, we’re helping retailers offer differentiated assortments while giving consumers meaningful products they feel connected to. It’s a model we believe will continue to shape the category as consumers increasingly seek brands and collections with personality, authenticity and lasting appeal.”
