#087 ✰ My Tailor Is My Friend: Stella Stark
doing magic with fabrics since age 8 • just moved to San Francisco • working at a sustainability consultancy
We’ve been in San Francisco three weeks, and already met with fantastic tailors and textile folks: mending specialists, thrift store nerds, quilting artists, a leather queen - whether professionals or volunteers - devoting their time to build and/or repair long-lasting objects, granting them a first, second or third life. It has been so inspiring to hear their stories.
Stella is one of them. She just moved from Boston to San Francisco. She’s turning 22 tomorrow (🥳), with close to 15 years of sewing experience. That’s how much she knows about it. I love how we met. Her partner Sushmit heard about Objet a while back - via another newsletter. He reached out and I onboarded him on what was an experimental voice journaling app at the time. I liked him a lot, and we stayed in touch. When he heard we were heading to SF to organize these denim parties [happening this Friday in Haight-Ashbury⚡️], he reached out to introduce me Stella. Two weeks later, we had dinner altogether at the Spice Jar in Potrero. We talked about languages, accents, family, sacrifices, dedication, role models, and a lot more. That is the internet I like. The one that enables IRL, physical connections.
Without further ado, please meet Stella.
OK Stella, tell me what you are working on right now?
I am making kind of a quilt, kind of a tapestry. It is a large pillow chair for my stairs, 60 inches by 70 inches. I am making this from fabrics I collected, some I have had from a long time, some I got from garage sales every now and then, mainly cotton.
I drew these lilies myself. We’ve just moved to San Francisco, and they were the first flowers we got for the flat. I really liked them, so I started drawing them, and well… maybe I should make a cloth out of it? That’s how it started! [laughs]
It’s the first time I am doing something this big. I had made smaller quilt works, more like 10x10 inches. I also did quilting with my dad during covid. It was the first time we were staying that much together as a family. What could we do that was not watching TV? My dad wanted to make a quilt, he always has these little ideas that turn into something. We made a quilt for him, a quilt for my brother. I didn’t get one [laughs]!
What is the story of this sewing machine?
I found it on Facebook Marketplace, here in San Francisco. It is a Belvedere Adler antique machine, all metal components - instead of plastic - and built to last an absolute lifetime and beyond, if you’re keen on repairing and maintaining it. It’s such a beautiful sewing machine, every time I use it just brings so much joy! These antiques can take on any fabrics, they’re smooth, they don’t do this ‘tac tac tac tac’.
I have another sewing machine that’s about to go to the shop to get fixed. A 1950s Singer, also all metal components. My aunt got it second hand and gave it to me.
wondering what’s the noise of an old sewing machine? Try this.
Dang! These are really cute slippers, did you make them?
I did. I found this fabric at my grand mother’s. The cotton had been embroidered by my great-grand mother! Naturally, I wanted to do something out of it, and so I made myself two pairs of slippers. The inner piece -which you can’t see on the picture- is made of my mom’s diaper cloths! Kind of a four-generation pair of slippers! [laughs]
Where do you get inspiration from?
I love going to museums, spending hours getting lost in the art. MOMA is my absolute favorite. Otherwise walking around, I always take picture of flowers, here and there. I am no longer on Instagram - it happened all of a sudden and I never went back-, I get inspiration from real life events and things.
Some of the art and artists that have really inspired me are Jesper Christiansen, places like the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark, all fashion exhibits, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC (see my favorite images from it), the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, art deco drawings, motifs such as these:
… and many objects that I’ve found super inspiring are also pinned here:
How did you get started with “working with fabrics”?
My grandma was the one who taught me how to sew first. Whenever she would come, she would give me little exercises, to try different kind of stitches. She got me my first sewing kit. And eventually when I was old enough, maybe 8 or 9, she taught me how to use a sewing machine.
The first thing I remember doing by myself was at in fifth grade, we had a game-related project, so I decided I would sew a hopscotch board. I was 9.
What do you like to create?
Everything, really! Once I have an idea in my head, and I think “OK maybe I can make this”, I always try. I don’t necessarily do it very successfully all the time, but I am in my zone with fabrics and sewing, I love mending, I love taking clothes and making them fit me, or making them fit my friends, I love to sew clothes, sewing objects, sewing cloths, knitting, everything with my hands. I just love fabrics.
What are your favorite fabrics?
I love vintage tea towels, they have beautiful embroideries. They have such a story, they are alive, they are beautiful. You get to interact with them everyday, they would live in a home. I love taking them and trying to do something else. I usually get them from garage sales, state sales, markets. There’s this flea market the first Sunday of the month, the Alameda Point Antiques Faire: I found a store selling beautiful old linen towels, I could have stayed there for hours…
Tea towels mainly come in white. The project I am working on right now - the patchwork lilies - parts of the flowers will be made from tea towels. The rest of the colours are all earth tones, my favorite.
What’s a piece you’ve made and are really proud of?
I made and designed everything in this image - except the pants (which have been repaired multiple times). My shirt and Sush’s jacket, I designed: linen from Merchant and Mills for the former, cotton oilskin for the latter. My jacket’s design is a Reese Cooper (RCI) but sewn by me - they were actually selling the design and fabric during covid for people to make!
What are your sewing routine?
When I wake up in the morning -at seven or earlier- I usually spend an hour sewing. I always forget to eat when I sew… In the morning is when I can be the more focused, not thinking about anything else, no-one is asking me anything yet. My mind is fresh.
Later in the day, the fight isn’t between sewing and work but rather between sewing and being social [laughs].
How do you learn?
The pieces I talked to you about, they look all very different but they’re actually kind of all the same. It’s just about figuring out how to make this flat thing into whatever 3D shape that you want it to be. I’ve learnt from Youtube, a lot from my grandmother and these old sewing books. There are so many stitches, it is insane!
Sometimes I use a pattern, but other times, when you’ve seen enough of the basic patterns, you can just figure it out.
My family as a whole has always been very encouraging at doing creative things. "Just try it, you’ll figure it out. You can do this”. We have a lot of trust in each other. My grandma knits, sews, weaves, she is so creative.
What do you like the most about working with fabrics?
This where I feel absolutely fluid with the fabric. I lose all sense of time and space and everything. The thing with fabrics is that it’s so flexible. It can be very forgiving. I interact with fabrics every day: with my eyes, my hands… I love making things. And with fabrics you can do pretty much anything you want - except like a hammer maybe?
What are your future plans?
Part of me moving to San Francisco would love to turn these things that bring me so much happiness and joy into something I can share with the world a bit more. It begins with sewing a couple useful things: the most beautiful tapestry quilted pot holders, using old materials. Pot holders are something you get to interact with every day. I also love that they can age very beautifully, with their own unique burn marks.
Then maybe doing art shows, art fairs. Creating my own brand.
Right now I work from home, but it’d be great to be surrounded by people working in textile!
How do people reach out?
Through my website 🌸 Stark Studio
Thanks so much Stella for sharing your passion with me and the rest of us! You seem to have found your vocation, what really moves you - and it is inspiring.
Want to meet Stella in real life?
I know you do.
We were told San Francisco was weird. We intend to live it that way on Friday. Join us at The Mellow Haight, 8pm. Get your denim tattooed. And dance too.
See ya, bisous 💋
Mathilde
that b&w pic of her and Sush with 100% handmade clothes 😱 can't wait to get her to work on my jeans 🫶