I’ve been making scarves from Vintage hankies for about five years.
I don’t make as many as I used to, but every once in a while someone will send me some colorful hankies and I gather enough together to make another scarf or two.
Linda, who bought a few of my Vintage Hankie Scarves, recently gave one to the minister at the retirement home where her mom lived.
The minister wore it as a stole to a Sunday Sermon and “centered her sermon around it”. She told Linda “…the sermon was a great hit and as the old women went to leave the chapel, many of them made a point of showing her that they were STILL carrying hankies and that they were not obsolete yet!”
I never know what will happen to one of my creations when I put it out into the world. But it’s stories like this that inspire me.
So much of my work is functional art that is easy to incorporate into everyday life.
That’s important to me, because making connections with people is one of the main purposes of my art. I see it as a way of coming together through an idea, image, object, or story.
It’s not likely, without Linda, that one of my scarves would have made its way to a minister in the midwest and touched the women in her congregation the way it did.
I picture the women, pulling their hankies out of their sleeves, where they tucked them, or from their big handbags as they left the sermon and showed them to their minister. And I feel a connection to them, through Linda’s story, even though we’ll never even meet.
This post touches me deeply, Maria. Those scarves are such a wonderful conversation piece, and I love the part you are playing in uniting people through your work.
We are passing right through your area the week before the Open House, alas, we cannot get back there to attend. Maybe next year!
Thank you Marcia. I’m sorry you’ll miss the Open House, it would be lovely to see you next year….
The history of hankies
Oh, what a tale
From gladiators
To Desdemona.
‘Little works of art’
And travel souvenirs
Paris landmarks
To desert Sedona.
All through the ages
Be it peasants or kings
One’s hanky tucked
Deftly away.
Passed down over time
Keepsakes plain to ornate
Ever a fresh one
To start the new day.
For the coquettish lass
Or well-heeled young gent
A kerchief held
Language not spoken.
No longer in fashion
Now relics past prime
Bring fabrics new life
And sew stories unbroken.
Oh Cheryl! What can I say, this is a wonderful poem of the hankie! I’ll have to reprint it on my blog for all to see, now I want to make more hankie scarves….You’ve inspired me!