A Journey in Leather
Posted on October 15 2017
I was living in Manhattan and appearing in the original company of a rather notorious show, “Oh Calcutta”. A friend, Joe Wemple and I were wandering past the window of a trendy boutique and stopped to marvel at a beautiful leather shirt in the window. Way out of our price range. I don’t know why, but something made me tell him I could make one just as beautiful. A little research led us to a garment leather warehouse. I bought some deerskin. It wasn’t difficult to work out how to make a pattern from one of Joe’s T shirts. A fine pair of Ginger scissors, a punch and some tapestry needles and I was on my way. Joe told me he would not make love to me until the shirt was finished. I made it in three days. He was so impressed by his lovely shirt that he decided to give a dinner party just to show it off.
During the dinner, one of our guests asked if I could make him one too. I started to say that I only made Joe’s and was not going to make more, but after receiving a small kick under the table I quickly responded with a yes.
Judy Carne, an old friend from my LA days when she was in “Laugh In” was living in New York at this time and asked me to make her a deerskin wedding dress.
In those days, in spite of being in a popular and much talked about show, the cast were underpaid, so making leather shirts, coats and skirts for others really helped me to stay financially afloat. Here's my first patchwork skirt made out of piedes from the leather store's "oddments" stash.
I made it during my days in Oh Calcutta. Photo taken by Caterine Milinaire in 1969. Those were fun days indeed.
I dropped out of the “Oh Calcutta” cast after about 14 months and made my way back to Los Angeles. I found a most amazing leather supply store called “Macpherson’s” and began a career in leather clothes. I only made them for private commissions and loved it. From then on, I had a nice collection of my own and wore the shirts and skirts on my travels through several different lands. My clothes were soft, often washable chamois, and graceful! I noticed people would open conversation with me because they had never seen garments quite like mine.
Adventures opened up more easily thanks to my leather work and I never traveled again without several skins in my luggage, ready to cut and thong. Here's the white deerskin shirt, a commission.
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