Fashion and lifestyle designer Kate Spade was found dead in her Manhattan residence of an apparent suicide Tuesday morning, sources told CBS News. According to reports, she was found by her housekeeper at her home on Park Avenue.
Per The New York Times, Spade was found in her bedroom "unresponsive." She was declared dead at 10:26 a.m. EST. Officials on the scene also told The Associated Press Spade is believed to have left a suicide note, though the contents thereof are unconfirmed.
The American fashion designer and businesswoman was 55 years old, and is survived by her husband Andy, and their 13-year-old daughter, Frances Beatrix Spade.
Spade met her husband while while working at a clothing store in Phoenix, Arizona, where they went to college. The couple later lived together in New York, where Spade worked at the fashion magazine Mademoiselle—and where she reportedly first got the idea for her namesake handbag brand. The couple launched Kate Spade Handbags in 1993, but sold their stake in the brand to Neiman Marcus in 2006 (as of 2018, it's owned by Coach Inc.). Spade was more recently the designer of the Frances Valentine label.
Details on this story are still developing, and this post will be updated with further information as it becomes available.
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This article originally appeared on Cosmopolitan.com. Minor edits have been made by the Cosmo.ph editors.