My first time in the Color Crossing studio was on a bustling Saturday morning with well over a dozen people working on their particular projects. They were knitting, weaving, sewing or considering their next yarn purchase – which involves long meditations on colors and textures. My second time was on a peaceful fall day and the quiet atmosphere allowed all the beautiful pieces of art on the walls, racks and looms to shine. I was here to meet with Nancy Gavin. Nancy makes wearable art and has sold her art at Color Crossing for the Creative Drive for last three years.

Jenelle: What is the first thing that you remember making?

Nancy: I feel like I’ve been sewing forever!  The very first thing that I made was an apron when I was 9 or 10.  It was for 4H and my teacher was Mrs Kimble.  She was a very good teacher and insisted that every stitch be perfect, which meant things were torn out several times before they were right.  Ever since then, I have always sewn.

What are you working on these days?

Lots of neck ties for one thing.  My brain is full of them.  A bazillion ties were donated to the studio so I’m thinking about ties.  I’ve made jackets with ties before and I’m in the process of hopefully making a coat for myself with them.  What I really want to do is make sure that my art is functional as well as hopefully unique.

What kinds of pieces give you the most joy to make?

I really like making things that people will wear.  The trick is then finding the person who is willing to wear them!

Do you feel like you are mostly an organized person or do you like a bit of clutter?

Oh, in some ways I’m organized but in some ways I’m not.  My work area is really a mess right now.  At home, I have a sewing room where I quilt.  There, on the walls, all the fabric is bunched by colors and then topics.  Fabrics are in tubs so things can be found.  But, there’s no door on the room because I get kind of claustrophobic. Sometimes you can barely get in the room.  I would say it’s organized confusion.

Have you made a piece that you especially cherish?

This particular jacket.  I don’t really know what I’ll do when I can’t wear it anymore.   I’ve worn it 150 times.  It’s probably the first thing that I made that used all sort of little pieces of fabric that is wearable.  After this jacket I’ve made 4 or 5 more just because I’ve figured this pattern out.

This is great.  What a good environment to be in, right?  There’s just so much creativity going on here.

Color Crossing is a great place. People here are encouraging and helpful and lots of ideas get shared.  So if you have started a project and not quite quite sure where to go with it, someone else will certainly tell you. So someone left this skirt on my table the other day. I don’t know who left it here and I’m not going to throw it away but I have to figure out what to do with it. With something like this, I might cut it into pieces or use it as it is, but you know, this is how thing happen around here.  Somebody drops it off at your table and you go from there.  And if I hold it up and we are all working here, someone might say, “Well this part reminds me of…” and ideas grow from those kinds of things.

So has the Creative Drive been a good venue for you?

Oh yeah. The Creative Drive is early enough so people are looking for things to wear for the Spring and Summer and looking for Mother’s Day gifts and that sort of thing.  And you just meet new people.  I especially like the people, they are the best part of it all.  It’s a nice time to reconnect with people that you don’t see very often.  I’ve met a lot of great folks at the Creative Drive who just care about the surroundings and tend to be very caring individuals.

So please join us at Color Crossing during the 2012 Creative Drive and see what imaginative way Nancy has devised to give those neck ties an honorable second life.  Color Crossing is a yarn shop and weavers studio in Roberts, WI.  It is one of four sites in the Creative Drive and will feature about a dozen artists with work from various mediums. Color Crossing has been a part of the Creative Drive since 2005.