Keeping Bravo in the family: Countess Luann de Lesseps’ niece Nicole Nadeau on Work of Art

Recording artist Countess Luann isn’t the only one in her family being creative or heating up the Bravo screens this summer, her niece Nicole Nadaeu will compete on Bravo’s latest competition show Work of Art: The Next Great Artist.

Nadaeu may have a few connections, but her work is genuinely intriguing. She jazzes up functional designs of usable products with new and artsy concepts. She studied at Rochester Institute of Technology and Parson’s School of Design (featured on Bravo’s lost child Project Runway), and earned a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts in Industrial Design. She worked for a while an a design and architectural firm before venturing out to do her own thing.

She co-founded KNS design collective with Kameron Grad, and they work hard reinventing everyday concepts like tablecloths and candlesticks, and making them their own. One of their charming designs is called “Spooning Cups:”

This isn’t completely her first moment in the public eye. One of her tablecloths showed up on the first season of Real Housewives of New York, and she had part in 2006’s under-the-radar The New Wave, which starred Andrew Keegan and John Krasinski.

It will be interesting to see how Nadeau interacts with some of the less functionally-minded artists.