Kaffe Fassett: Dreaming in Color , livre ebook

For Brandon Mably
This page : A watercolor of decorative boxes I did in Holland in the 1980s. This page : Working in my painting studio. This page : A cabinet in my studio, packed to the brim. This page : My 1999 study of rose-covered objects.
Published in 2012 by Stewart, Tabori Chang An imprint of ABRAMS
Text copyright 2012 Kaffe Fassett All photographs and illustrations copyright Kaffe Fassett unless otherwise noted on this page . Photograph of Nepenthe on this page by Morley Baer. 2012 by the Morley Baer Photography Trust, Santa Fe. All rights reserved.
All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Fassett, Kaffe. Kaffe Fassett : dreaming in color : an autobiography / Kaffe Fassett.
p. cm.
A Melanie Falick book. ISBN 978-1-58479-996-2 1. Fassett, Kaffe. 2. Fashion designers-United States-Biography. I. Title. II. Title: Dreaming in color : an autobiography. TT505.F37F37 2012 746.9 2092-dc23
2011049250
UK edition ISBN: 978-1-61769-007-5
Editor: Melanie Falick with Betty Christiansen and Sally Harding Designer: Anna Christian Production Manager: Tina Cameron
Stewart, Tabori Chang books are available at special discounts when purchased in quantity for premiums and promotions as well as fundraising or educational use. Special editions can also be created to specification. For details, contact specialsales@abramsbooks.com or the address below.

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CONTENTS
Introduction
chapter one
1937-1956
Childhood in California
chapter two
1956-1964
Striking Out On My Own
chapter three
1964-1969
England in the Swinging Sixties
chapter four
1970-1979
My Design Work Takes Off
chapter five
1980-1989
The Glorious Eighties
chapter six
1990 and Beyond
Finding Color in a Gray World
Resources
Acknowledgments
Photo Credits
Index of Searchable Terms
In front of a painting I did of my Welsh dresser full of china. I ve always had a passion for china, and London, with its great flea markets and antique shops, has been an excellent place to form a collection.
As I sit in my studio surrounded by my creative material-fabrics, yarns, paper prints, shelves of books, and collections of decorative objects-I can t help but reflect on the path that led me here. What astounds me the most is the confidence and faith in myself I have always possessed, from my early years as a free-spirited boy on the wild California coast, to a young man who strode into England and the world of design and made a place for himself. I never felt daunted by difficulties or blocked alleys. Somehow, I knew the path I was on was right, and my trust in that sense was stronger than the limitations of my own personal comforts or desires. If I ever doubted my direction or wanted to give up, key friends in my life encouraged me to press on.
Over the years I know I have had guidance from guardian angels, who have helped me at every turn. They have ranged from family members and collaborative partners to the colorful travelers who serendipitously crossed my path as they sought the beauty of Big Sur, California, my family home, filling my young imagination with impressions of the Old World and details of their eclectic lives. This education was more extensive than I could have known at that age. I conjured up a vivid land from all those tales told around the fire at our family restaurant. Since then, I have found a home in England, in the world of textile arts, and in a glorious life of my own design.
The magnificent Santa Lucia Mountains as seen from the terrace of Nepenthe. The patio is made of cut redwood rounds.

chapter one
1937-1956
Childhood in California

School photo, aged 12, taken at my tiny Big Sur school.

My sister Dorcas and I dancing on the terrace of Nepenthe, the family restaurant in Big Sur.

The Fassett family trying out ballet positions on the Nepenthe bleachers, with our log cabin home in the background.

When I was nine, my parents built a stunning modern restaurant perched on the cliffs of Big Sur, California, where the whole family lived and worked. As a barefoot boy on the California coast, I loved the rugged terrain . . . redwood canyons, beaches, and steep mountains. This spectacular, isolated setting turned out to be a big draw for artists, writers, musicians, and actors, and our family-run business became a magnet for interesting people-both staff and visitors-from across the globe. Meeting these larger-than-life characters stimulated my young mind and was a powerful influence. Their confident personalities and colorful stories about the exotic worlds of Europe and the Orient filled me with longing to experience those places for myself. The progressive boarding school I attended as a teenager, which was full of cultured teachers and inquiring students, would further intensify my burgeoning enthusiasm for a creative life of my own.

My drawing of Chaco, our favorite Russian maintenance man at Nepenthe.

Me in 1938. I m told I was always laughing as a baby.

Mom stepping out in Capri in the early 1930s.
1937-1946
My early years in San Francisco and Carmel
I was born on December 7, 1937, at 2:47 a.m., at the Children s Hospital in San Francisco-December 7 would later become the infamous Pearl Harbor day. My parents, Bill and Lolly Fassett, were both twenty-six at the time and already had a one-year-old in tow, my brother Griff. Dad and Mom debated about a name for me. Griff had been named after Dad s maternal grandfather, William Eliot Griffis, so Dad said, Why not please your family and name him after your grandfather? Mom had adored her maternal grandfather Frank Powers, and she readily agreed, signing my birth certificate Frank Powers Fassett.
My antecedents were an eclectic mix of art philanthropists, entrepreneurs, academics, artists, suffragettes, and writers. This made my parents encourage creativity in anyone who crossed their paths. Mom was a great romantic and loved the color in life, and Dad loved drama. Neither had cultivated an art or craft, so they didn t impose any particular artistic discipline on their kids. Still, they were always keen to promote celebration and heightened fun.
Mom had been a very handsome young woman in her early life and had traveled around Europe with her painter grandmother, Jane Gallatin Powers, wife of Frank Powers. After Frank s death in 1920, Jane emigrated to Europe, taking her two youngest daughters-her oldest daughter, my grandmother, was already married and had had my mother by that time, so she stayed behind in San Francisco. At the age of seventeen, my mother left California and went over to join Jane. Mom would regale us with tales of her six years spent in Paris, Rome, and Capri. One story I loved was how on arriving at grand hotels, my great-grandmother would unscrew the door handles and replace them with her own more decorative ones.
Mom also told us about the dashing, unusual clothes she wore during her years in Europe. She often described an apple green satin dress she had worn, for which she had made one peacock blue shoe and one emerald green. Is it any wonder I should develop a passion for color with inspirational visions like that embedded in my memory? One of Mom s aunts married the governor of Capri, so Mom spent many summer days swimming and evenings attending receptions and dancing at grand balls.
My father was tall and handsome with a wicked sense of humor that gained more of a sadistic edge as he really got to know you. His personality would have made him a good twenty-first-century TV presenter, prying out embarrassing stories from unsuspecting people. He was also an eclectic and avid reader. Politics, religion, and the American Civil War were among his favorite subjects. He talked often of writing a great book, but those plans remained in the realm of talk-a sad fact that motivated me to act on my own dreams.
Dad s upbringing, mostly in California, was rather bohemian for the time, and after finishing Cornell University, where he studied hotel management, he returned to California and started working as a merchant marine. He lived next door to Mom in San Francisco, and it was only a matter of time before these two handsome people would get together. They were both born in 1911 and married at twenty-four.
At the time of my birth, my mother and father were living in the Powers family home on Steiner Street in San Francisco where my mother had grown up. Her maternal grandparents, Frank and Jane Gallatin Powers, were the founders of the artist colony in Carmel-by-the-Sea on the beautiful wild coast of California. They had bought a house on the edge of the Carmel beach called The Dunes when they were developing the colony, but they also had this San Francisco house, as Frank had his law practice there. Jane s father was Albert Gallatin, a wealthy California businessman who was an early pioneer of hydroelectric power and power transmission, and was the president of the largest hardware, iron, and steel company on the West Coast. A self-made man, he built himself a large house in Sacramento that later became the governor s mansion for thirteen California governors.
My father s antecedents were pretty impressive as well. His maternal grandfather, William Eliot Griffis, was a noted American Orientalist and writer who had been decorated in Japan for his work in education there. Dad s birth father was Edward Lee McCallie, whose family had founded the McCallie School, a renowned boy s school, in Chattanooga, Tennessee, but his mother, Kevah, divorced and remarried when he was still a baby. His wealthy stepfather, Newton Crocker Fassett, was William s best friend and the man who, by ado