This brand wasn't always called KIVÉ. If you've been with me for a while, you knew us by another name — Cherie. And this spring, I had to let that name go. Not because I wanted to. Because a trademark dispute made keeping it impossible.
I didn`t know what`s next, felt like a part of me was let go.
I won't pretend it was graceful. When you've sewn hundreds of pieces under a name, that name stops being a word — it's stitched into everything. Losing it felt less like paperwork and more like being asked to introduce myself all over again.
And then, somewhere between the panic and the paperwork, it hit me: maybe that was exactly the point.
If I had to introduce myself again, I would do it with a name nobody could ever take from me.
The name that was mine first
Before I was married, my surname was Ķīvīte. In Latvian, a ķīvīte is a lapwing — a small meadow bird with a crest like a crown, one of the first voices you hear when spring returns to Latvia.
Soften the spelling for the rest of the world, keep the soul, and you get KIVÉ. A name that isn't borrowed from French romance or invented in a branding workshop. It was on my school notebooks. It was mine before any of this existed.
My grandmother, whose last name was Ķīvīte, is someone I never had the chance to meet, yet she has always represented strength, perseverance, dignity, and righteousness to me. Everything I've heard about her through the stories of those who knew her has left a lasting impression, and I strive to carry those same values into my brand.
How it happened
Cherie Lingerie
A one-woman atelier in Riga grows into a small team, sewing lingerie, swimwear and bodysuits to order — every piece cut and finished by hand.
The letter arrives
A trademark challenge means the name has to go. Months of work — packaging, labels, the website, the little details nobody sees — suddenly have an expiry date.
The choice
Instead of inventing something safe and forgettable, I went backwards — to the name I was born with. Ķīvīte became KIVÉ.
KIVÉ opens its doors
Same hands, same needles, same atelier — new name on the label. And honestly? A truer one.
Ķīvīte · Vanellus vanellus
About that bird
The lapwing is small, but nobody tells her that. When something threatens her nest, she doesn't hide — she flies straight at it, loud and theatrical and utterly unbothered by the size difference.
A small bird that defends what she's made, announces spring before anyone believes in it, and wears a crest like she was born for an occasion. I couldn't have designed a better mascot if I'd tried.
What changed — and what never will
The name on the label changed. The rest didn't. Every KIVÉ piece is still sewn to order in Riga by a small team of women who know your order by name, not by number. Still no warehouse of mass-produced stock. Still lingerie made for women who dress for themselves first.
If anything, the rebrand gave me a gift I didn't ask for: it forced me to decide, on paper, what this brand actually is. And the answer was sitting in my own name the whole time.
So — welcome to KIVÉ. It's very nice to introduce myself again.
— Agate
Founder · KIVÉ Atelier, Riga
