Studio Notes - Fall 2025
Our back stairway with new ironwork railing.
Sometimes you get lucky. I met a blacksmith named Don Asbee through Jo Stealey, a dear friend and fine artist in Columbia, Missouri. One thing led to another and here we have the most extraordinary railing imaginable on our stairway. For me, besides getting to live with it every day, the joy was in designing it and having someone with skills far beyond anything I could imagine make the idea come to life. Thank you, Don.
To do:
Take a walk. Two good friends, husband and wife, had a difficult decision to make with a looming deadline. A third friend suggested that they take a walk. An intentional walk. By talking about the decision, weighing the pros and cons of each choice, while moving and not looking at each other but instead at the beautiful autumn landscape that we are now experiencing, they found it easier to come to a decision than it had been through emails, distracted face-to-face conversations and individual fretting. I’m going to remember that for the next time I feel flummoxed by an important decision.
To see:
Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in Deer Isle, Maine is an extraordinary architectural landmark, arts school and community. This video was produced by Fibre Arts Take Two (soon to be renamed Take Two Art Courses) after visiting during one of the two weeks that occur each spring when volunteers return to reopen the campus after a long winter’s rest. It captures so much about the place and is simply beautiful, as well.
To read:
The online course that I taught this last spring for Fibre Arts Take Two was titled “Finding”. One of the lovely aspects of the course was a book, both online and hardcopy, of students’ work submitted at the end of the course. Here you can see some of the work that resulted from our time together. It’s remarkable.
I hope you have something to look at each day that brings as much delight as this shelf over our kitchen sink. Work by Tim McCreight, Abby Huntoon and Lynn Duryea, all Maine artists, create a little world that invites me in.
Still making spoons, some already made and some potential parts here.
Coming up
This fall is thankfully slow compared with the first half of the year. Next year brings teaching the online course mentioned above again, a new book about the last 20 years of my work, a show at Cove Street Arts and a couple of other possibilities. It’s going to be a busy one!
Right now, the idea I am exploring for the show next year is the relationship of chaos and order. I think I’ll have a lot of inspiration! May you have order in your life and the tools to deal with the chaos.
All best,
Lissa