Illuminating
the overlooked
and everyday
through
historical
storytelling.
Kassia St. Clair is an acclaimed author and storyteller and the UK’s best selling historian under 40. She specialises in telling illuminating stories about the overlooked and the everyday.
She has sold hundreds of thousands of books globally and is best known for The Secret Lives of Colour.
Kassia is valued for her thoughtful use of historical details that make ambitious and technical subjects accessible and memorable. Her writing is sumptuous, witty and a joy to read.
Kassia’s readers find themselves learning new and unexpected things about the world and how the everyday came to be.
Discover Kassia’s work:
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Books.
Bestselling, mind-expanding and sumptuous cultural histories
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Podcast.
The Blue Plaque Pod, your new favourite history podcast.
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Talks.
Find out more about upcoming in-person and online talks.
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Writing.
A selection of published essays, criticism, profiles and long reads.
About.
Kassia St. Clair is a bestselling writer and cultural historian. Her first book, The Secret Lives of Colour, was a top-ten bestseller, was selected as Radio 4′s Book of the Week and has been translated into twenty languages. A new edition was released in October 2025 with 25 new colours in celebration of the book’s approaching 10 year anniversary and global success.
The Golden Thread: How Fabric Changed History was a Radio 4 Book of the Week, a Sunday Times Book of the Year and was shortlisted for the Somerset Maugham Award.
The Race to the Future charts the true story of a quest that helped shape the world we live in today. It reached The New York Times Top 10 Best Seller list in September 2026, was Barnes & Noble Book of the Month and BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week.
Most recently, Liberty London, the distinguished firm and department store invited her to write ‘Liberty: Design. Pattern. Colour’ in celebration of their 150 year anniversary.
Features, interviews, essays and reviews have appeared in the Economist, the Telegraph, Architectural Digest, World of Interiors, the Times Literary Supplement; she had written about colour and textiles for Elle Decoration for over a decade. You can see a selection of her published work on the journalism page.
An accomplished speaker, Kassia has given talks at international venues including the Dallas Art Museum, Hay Festival, the Victoria & Albert Museum and Soho House and for brands including Chanel, Farrow & Ball and Christie’s. She has contributed to NPR, BBC Radio 4, and CNN among others. In 2018 she created an exhibit for Color Factory, New York. Find out about upcoming events on her Talks page.
To hear about current projects, upcoming events and stories that got her thinking, sign up to her newsletter.