Goth, God, and Glory – An Interview with KAT VON D

Interview by Ryan Simón

Kat Von D has always operated at a certain intensity. Her first shop was called High Voltage, and the name was no accident. That charge ran through her early career as an era-defining figure in contemporary tattoo culture, and later through beauty, music, and a public life that rarely stayed quiet. After famously blacking out her tattoos, what stands out now is not a simple reinvention but a shift in where that intensity is directed.

While much attention has been paid to Kat’s blackout tattoos, she makes clear in our conversation the distinction between surface change and the kind that actually lasts. The first can be seen. The second is internal, a reorientation of values, attention, and belief. The same drive that formerly made her a reality TV icon as the star of TLC’s L.A. Ink and an archetypal figure of 2000s alt culture has, in recent years, turned toward questions of meaning, discipline, and faith. When spoken aloud, the questions are simple and perennial: How do I live a good life? How do I raise my family and support my community? How do I make the world, the real world, a better place?

These are the questions that shape the following conversation about the power of ritual and intention, the relationship between aesthetics and belief, and the ongoing work of living according to what she holds true.

Several major moments in your life have been marked by deliberate acts of transformation, from moving to Vevay and blacking out your tattoos to your baptism. At a time when many people feel modern life lacks meaningful rites of passage, what role do ritual and tradition play in your life?

That’s a tricky question. I just recently converted to Orthodox Christianity. It’s an ancient faith, so there’s a big emphasis on tradition, which I love. Worshipping in the way people did 2,000 years ago is awesome. I like that it’s gone unchanged in a world where everything is so disposable, so temporary. I can see why there’s a recent flocking to something more profound, deep, and meaningful. At least, that was the case for me. People sometimes have this perception of religion being ritualistic, and I think when some people hear the word “ritual,” they think it’s mechanical, that you’re just doing something because you’re supposed to do it. Communion, to me, is ritualistic in a way, but it’s so intentional. It doesn’t feel robotic. There’s meaning and symbolism behind the whole process. That’s something I respond to. And I think you’re right that there has been a bit of a pendulum swing: We’ve been inundated with excessiveness for so long that people are now seeking depth. I’ve always been a seeker, and I’ve definitely looked for truth in a lot of wrong places. I’ve looked for love in a lot of wrong places too, but that’s just part of growing up.

What were you hoping to find when you moved from L.A. to Vevay?

I’ve been restoring Victorian homes for the last decade and a half or so, and the Schenck Mansion is what brought us to this town. Prior to seeing this house, I’d never really spent time in Indiana outside of traveling there on tour. It’s not like we knew anyone out here at all. During 2020, my husband and I really wanted to explore living outside of California. When this house went on the market, I thought we should fly out to see it. It’s a very unique, very beautiful house, built in 1838 by Benjamin Franklin Schenck. It’s the crown jewel of the town. When we flew in, we fell in love not just with the house, but with the town and the people. There are a lot of working-class families, and there’s a simplicity that comes with that that I desire. I really saw myself living here. It wasn’t an abstract fantasy of wanting to live with cowboys. It was more that we could own land, probably grow our own food, and build a community, which is something I never had when I lived in Hollywood. The house I lived in at Hancock Park—I was there for eight years—and I couldn’t tell you my neighbors’ names. That’s just how it is in big cities. L.A. will always own a corner of my heart, but it’s a different life. A different world.

The constant coming and going of a city like Los Angeles can make it difficult to build a lasting sense of community.

It’s just different. There’s something to be said about places where a lot of people gather, but when it becomes millions of people in a very small area, it becomes a mutation of what a community should be. I think most people in L.A. desire it. My friends and I were always trying to find our corner of the city to create a sense of community.

Your own 90210 Peach Pit hangout spot.

Exactly. It’s just challenging in a bigger city. Here, it’s like everyone knows what Marsha’s doing. Everyone’s looking out for each other. There are pros and cons to everything, obviously. The gossip train is out of control over here, but it’s much more wholesome gossip compared to talking about the personal, intimate details of celebrities you’ve never met. I think that’s so weirdly inappropriate. Small towns can also have this uncanny “lived in” ghost town quality. Reminds me of this quote I love, which is that every home is either soulless or haunted. The Schenck Mansion seems to fall under the haunted category, based on its reputation. Has that been your experience? I’ve been to some very dark places in the world, where terrible things have happened. You feel an energy that’s sad. You feel the loss. I’ve been to the edges of the train tracks of Treblinka and just felt a sorrow that can’t be explained. Here, I honestly don’t think it’s haunted. I think people want things to be haunted. They want to experience something supernatural. Having said that, the lady who sold it to me said the house gets quiet if it likes you.

“I’ve always been a seeker, and I’ve definitely looked for truth in a lot of wrong places. I’ve looked for love in a lot of wrong places too, but that’s just part of growing up.”

What draws you to these historic places?

I’m just obsessed with old things. I won’t bash on technology because there are some beautiful things that come from it. I mean, I make electronic music but I think there’s this thirst for the human fingerprint. The storytelling behind Victorian or Gothic architecture, there’s just so much meaning behind them. I appreciate that. A majority of people would probably be spooked to stay in a house like this because of its caricature as a haunted house. But we live in it. It’s our normal. We’re not scared.

From the beginning of L.A. Ink, you had a clear eye for designing physical spaces, from the lay-out of High Voltage to the home you’re restoring today. Do you see a connection between tattooing and interior design?

I’m all about composition, whether it’s doing a tattoo or designing the layout for a living room. It’s nothing I went to school for. I just like when things fit together beautifully. There’s something very satisfying about that. With tattooing, it’s a little more emotional, at least for me because you’re trying to create a composition that matches not only the person’s body but also their story. Getting to know why they want a tattoo definitely plays a big part in how you approach the subject matter, whereas with a house, it’s more objective. There’s a certain balance that takes place: placing certain things in certain corners. Having said that, I’ve had a lot of friends say I should do interior design, but I just think I’d be so useless unless we’re doing weird, gothic, Victorian stuff.

With your blackout tattoos, did you have to mentally adjust to seeing yourself differently? How has the experience affected your sense of self ?

In a good way, it has. I love my blackout tattoos, but I didn’t realize they’d be so controversial. I remember the first section I blacked out was my forearm, and when I posted a picture of it, it felt like when I first got into tattooing, back when everybody hated tattoos. I felt like Julia Roberts going to the mall and getting rejected for her appearance. It’s nostalgic! I love it, feeling like an outsider again. It’s not that I regret my tattoos. A lot of people view them as landmarks in time, and they are, but I don’t need a tattoo to remind myself that I dated a jerk who cheated on me. [Laughs.] I also don’t sit here and look at those tattoos and cry either. I just personally like the aesthetic of the blackout. There is something about dedicating yourself to a change that feels very extreme to most people. I like knowing that I can dedicate myself to something and follow through, and I think the blackout is a symbol of that. You have to have a certain level of discipline to put yourself through that. It’s not instantly gratifying. I don’t think it’ll ever become a trend for that reason. I like the uniqueness of it in that sense, in addition to its simplicity. People have been blacking themselves out for a long time. It’s just only now been spotlit through people like Ronnie Radke and Machine Gun Kelly. I get that it looks crazy, like I’m wearing a giant scuba suit all the time, but I love it. I definitely don’t feel naked when I’m naked.

Your first album came out in 2021, around the same time you were moving more deeply toward Christianity. Was that timing incidental, or do you see a relationship between your music and your faith?

That entire album was about a very specific relationship, written prior to me finding Christ. There’s nothing I’d call religious on that album. On the second album, I definitely talked about topics that pertain to spirituality, but I’m just not interested in making worship music. I think (a) I’m not worthy of it and (b) in the Orthodox Church, they don’t use instruments. There’s chanting, and they’re singing songs that are literally ancient and, to me, beyond perfection. It’s the sound of what angels would sing. To flatter myself by thinking I could write anything close to that … I’d rather talk about subjects that pertain to life that aren’t necessarily preaching or creating worship music. For example, there’s a song called “Set Myself On Fire” on the last album that deals with the challenges of being in an unequally yoked marriage. At first, I thought nobody was going to relate to this, but sure enough plenty of people do. I sprinkle in subjects of faith and devotion without it becoming that genre.

Artists often treat aesthetics as vessels for meaning, while others believe certain symbols are inherently good or evil. How do you think about the relationship between aesthetics, morality, and faith?

I’ve actually thought about this. Why do I find beauty in things that most people would probably be scared by? I don’t know. I think my life experiences make it easy for me to look at something like a Rick Owens runway show without being scared. I love the alien look of the models. It doesn’t shake my faith in any way. What matters is more internal. I was very promiscuous prior to finding my way back to the church. In the Orthodox Christian faith, when you enter the church and become Orthodox, you receive a patron or matron saint. Because my name is Katherine, a lot of my friends assumed I would take on Saint Catherine. I absolutely love her story, but I really felt connected to Saint Mary of Egypt. Her story is one of the darkest, but also the most beautiful, because her life was one of repentance. She was a very troubled girl at a young age but was able to turn her life around. To me, I feel more triumphant in those ways. Black lip- stick? That’s so trivial to me. I went on tour with the band In This Moment, and their content is very dark and very secular and even occult. I got some pushback from Christians, some even within my own parish, who mostly just wanted to understand why I would tour with someone who doesn’t align with me. I get it, but do you only work with people who think exactly the same as you? Do you only associate within an echo chamber of your values? It’s important to bring light wherever you go. I have friends of all walks of life, and I love them all equally. I’ve never understood the idea of cutting people off because you don’t share the same politics, religion, parenting style, or all those other things. It’s very weird to me, but a lot of people are like that.

Do you ever feel there’s tension between your gothic aesthetic and your faith?

No, because I don’t think there’s any wickedness in any- thing I’m doing. I’ve always tended to be more on the modest side naturally anyway. I’m not a very “here’s my boobs!” kind of person, even though I’m not bothered by that either. I see statues of the female figure, and I think they’re very beautiful. It’s more that there’s been a make- over of my mind and my heart. They’ve definitely been reprogrammed. Things that I used to find very attractive are repulsive at times. Do I go to church with black lipstick on? No. When I’m at church, I wear a head covering. I don’t wear makeup. I dress in a way that is not seeking any attention. I make myself a shadow so as not to distract anyone. There’s a deep reverence I feel when I enter our church. That’s just my own take. I’m not saying all Christians need to do that. I’m too busy cleaning up my side of the street to worry about what other people are doing. I have changed certain things about myself, but will I always be expressing myself in a creative way? Yes. I don’t think God wants us not to do that.

Funny enough, your new store, VON D LAND, is a very happy, yellow space.

It’s the happiest place on earth.

“I’m too busy cleaning up my side of the street to worry about what other people are doing.”

VON D LAND began as a shoe line before evolving into a physical store. How did that happen?

I had a shoe line called Von D Shoes that did well for a while. I just started expanding because I wanted to make more than shoes. I love design. I love architecture and home décor. I was never into cooking, but now, as I get older and step into this chapter of motherhood, I want to create beautiful things to cook in and other things that match my personality. I decided to call it “VON D LAND” because I’m creating a world instead of just shoes. My dad’s a contractor, and he’s moving out here as well. We wanted to bring some life into this small town. It essentially is a ghost town. Our main street is made up of 10 buildings, and half of them are abandoned. I was just going to run my distribution through VON D LAND and create some jobs, but then my dad said we should open a storefront because it would bring more people to the town. It’s a very small shop, and we painted it floor to ceiling yellow. A happy-face yellow. I personally love yellow. It’s one of my favorite colors to be photographed against. I wear black all the time, so it’s a nice contrast. Aside from VON D LAND, we purchased another building my dad and I will turn into a restaurant, and then my husband and I purchased an old church from 1838. We want to turn it into a music venue. I would love for it to be a more intimate middle ground between Cincinnati and Louisville for musicians on tour. There is a desire, especially for families, to experience things outside of your phone. Last year was our third year doing the black tulip fields. I started with 10,000 black tulips, then we grew to 15,000, and it’s just something I do in front of my house that’s free. People come from all over the country to see these black tulips that only bloom for two weeks. The first year, maybe 3,000 people came. This last year, we had more than 40,000 people. Really, this is the community that I’m talking about. Helping each other and coming together, it’s just a really beautiful thing to do in a little, tiny town that thrives off things like this.

Given your upbringing in a religious household and now raising your own family in Vevay, does any part of this feel like coming full circle?

Yeah, kind of. I was born in Mexico in 1982 in a pueblito in the middle of nowhere, with no running water. I loved our modest upbringing. My parents were, and are, Christian. My dad was a missionary for the church, and that was why we were born in Mexico at the time. My parents were from South America originally. I left home and went on my journey to figure out life, took a lot of detours, and eventually made my way back to Christ. I don’t know if it’s a full-circle moment because I think it’s different when you’re raised Christian and later come to it on your own. It’s important to go through the phase of questioning everything so that you can have a real understanding. It’s not just, “I do this because mom and dad make me.” Even now, my dad is still a churchgoing Christian, I’d say of the more Protestant flavor. He came to my son’s baptism, and to him it’s very depressing and boring. For me, I appreciate the ancientness of it all. I have a harder time going to a church that is more like a rock show. I’m not judging or criticizing. God speaks to people in ways I have no reason to question, but to me, it takes me out of it. There’s a natural reverence that happens when you step into a place that is holy. It’s just different. So, I don’t know if I’d say it’s a full-circle moment. I think this was the process it needed to take for it to be sincere and real. I had to fuck up a lot in order to become a good mom, a good wife, and a good Christian.

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