KAI AVENT-DELEON
Kai Avent-deLeon is a Brooklyn native and creative force behind Sincerely, Tommy, S,T Eat & Stay, and Raini Home.
Like her mother and grandmother before her, Kai Avent-deLeon has used grassroots innovation to cultivate her brand. She incorporates the ideals of her local community to that of her ancestral connections when cultivating the concepts for spaces and for her practice.
DV1 Divider
Painted Wood
62”H x 18”D x Variable Width
“I want to create a self-sufficient economy for the Black community and contribute to that.”
— Kai Avent-deLeon
"I wanted to be a pioneer in that sense; I wanted something for us, and for the people moving here. I envisioned it as a place that would be heavily involved in the community, supporting local artists, and focusing on smaller brands."
— Kai Avent-deLeon
“I never pictured Sincerely Tommy just being this retail space, for me, it was more of a lifestyle brand: a restaurant, a hostel, a furniture line.”
— Kai Avent-deLeon
“… two years ago I was in a place where Sincerely Tommy … was part of my identity so much that I was forgetting who I was, and I think with motherhood, as many women will probably say, you’re reborn; it’s the biggest mirror that you’ll ever have. So now I have a different view on the business and I look at it as something that I have created, and I feel blessed to have the ability to navigate and structure it the way I want to. My mindset is: I have created this space and the only way it can grow is if I give up a part of it. But I don’t even look at it as giving it up, I’m looking at it as allowing it to grow.”
— Kai Avent-deLeon
Bed Stuy entrepreneurs Kai Avent-deLeon, Lisa deLeon and Doreen deLeon
Photo by Michel Arnaud | Styling by Jane Creech
“My mom and my grandmother have played a huge role in my passion for being an entrepreneur and paving my own way.”
— Kai Avent-deLeon