Keeping Up with the Fashionistas – Jean Paul Gaultier at the de Young

Ow do you do zat?

Type Jean Paul Gaultier into the interweb machine and you’ll get a bunch of images of a middle-aged man in a striped shirt. Then you’ll start to see clothing that Monsieur Gaultier has created over the past three decades. And you’ll begin to see many wonderous things. And you’ll become interested.

From this point you can research and study, explore and critique.

And I guarantee that you’ll find something that makes you think!

And I guarantee that you’ll find something you like!

Black and white on the runway

from elegant

Green dress on runway

to luscious…

Coral

from figurative

detail of Paris dress

to literal.

Now I am NOT going to give you a lesson or a speech bout Gaultier. One, because I know exactly squat about him or fashion or couture. And two, because I am sure it’s all been done before.

Do I qualify?

I do want to show you some photographs that I took at the recent exhibit of Jean Paul Gaultier’s work that I visited at the M.H. de Young Museum in San Francisco.

shell bustier on mermaid wedding dress

detail of beading on mermaid wedding dress

I almost didn’t go to the show – what do I know for fashion?

Sis-ters Boom Ba; a trip to the Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show – Part 1

Nice Quilt wall at the Stitchin’ Post in Sisters, Oregon

Here’s the question: is the Sister’s Outdoor Quilt Show and its week-long class extravaganza, tantalizingly named A Quilter’s Affair, worth all the hoopla and hype?

Well, put it this way: the seven-day event is like the Tour de France of quilting, the Ryder Cup of quilt teachers, and the Superbowl of quilts all in one place – just for the quilt lovers of the world to enjoy. Oh yeah, and it’s set in a stunningly beautiful setting with clean streets, good food and decent coffee. So I guess the answer is a resounding YES!

Let’s go to Oregon on a small plane

The event is so big that I have to take it in bits, and I’ll walk you through it both from a teacher’s point of view and as a humble visitor.

The three sisters

To start with, Sisters, Oregon, is named after these three sister mountains, named Faith, Hope and Charity. They gaze down over the pretty little town and its surrounding valley.

Tree trunk

It’s quite a captivating place, a little bit country…

Ponderosa Lodge Llama

And a lot country…

The town hosts an annual Rodeo, a yearly music festival and the quilt show. The place runs like a well-oiled machine and everyone is kind and accommodating to the hoards that descend upon this small town for these events. I can’t say that I have experienced such a positive atmosphere in a whole community before; it really is quite remarkable.

Stitchin’ Post sign

The heart and soul of the quilting event is the Stitchin’ Post, which is an incredible quilt store created by Jean Wells-Keenan. She, along with her wonderful daughter Valori Wells and a fabulous staff, has been hosting the quilt show for more than 30 years.

Valori Wells’ fabrics and patterns

Valori’s talents are multifold, and they are not limited to what is on display at the store. She has designed beautiful fabrics, created many sewing patterns, and has published several successful books. Look at this lovely sight of some of her work that greets you at the door of the store!

This is just some of the yellows!

A trip to the store would by itself be incentive enough to vacation in this town. The collections of fabrics are drool-erific!

More Kaffe Fasset & Co.

Alexander Henry fabrics and lots of laminates

Flannels!

White background!

For a white fabric freak like me, this aisle was enough to make me break out in hives. I can go to two or three stores and not find one fabric with a white background, and at the Stitchin’ Post there were whole ROWS of it. I was so overwhelmed I didn’t buy a thing; I couldn’t decide where to start!

My Books!

Finding my books for sale in the store was such a pleasure, and I was doubly delighted to have Maverick Quilts and Dream Chair Quilts next to Emily Cier’s books. I had bought Scrap Republic for a dear friend as a special Christmas present!

Pretty flower arrangement made by Valori’s daughter Olivia

The first night that I was there, the teachers were invited to a dinner hosted by Jean Wells-Keenan and her jovial husband John. The food was amazing and the quilted eye candy was superb!

Upholstered chair at Jean Wells’ house

I had the pleasure of meeting many quilters that night, including Rosalie Dace, Barbara Shapel, June Jaeger, Rob Appell, Emily Cier and Scott Hansen. I’ll tell you more about these characters in future posts.

Chair upholstered with Jean Wells’ quilt art

To avoid standing around like a tourist at Disneyland taking photos of everything and anything, I only snapped a couple of pictures at Jean’s house (with permission), but I’ll just say that I wish my house looked a tiny bit like her’s.

Lego cell phone geek-wonderful

To tell the truth, I felt like a fish out of water; I’ve never been great at parties. But, Valori and Jean were very kind and welcoming to me, which really helped. I was also lucky to meet Emily Cier that night and share a bit of her lego-zany-alien-phone-mojo-fun.

I was pretty tired and cranky by bedtime that night, but the adventure was just beginning!

Stay tuned…