A small adventure

My husband's nephew is in town for the week. We decided to make today a museum day. We left the house thinking that we would go to the Met. We took the cross town bus and walked downtown along Fifth Avenue. On the way to the met we stopped off at the Cooper -Hewett.

There was an exhibit called Scrap about how designers are using waste materials from the textile industry to create fashion and usable objects.

One artists begins with saris.

The saris are used in three stages. In the first, Western style garments are cut from the yardage.  In the second stage, mixed fabrics are pieced together and then over dyed in one color. I didn't take photos of the garments in the first two stages, they were nice enough, but not all that exciting.

In the next couple of stages the artist uses smaller and smaller bits of the saris.

The base fabric is made out of over-dyed saris and then circles of waste sari fbric are appliqued to the base.

Curtains in the exhibit space were made out of cut work doily's and more of the sari-waste fabric circles appliques onto white cotton.

  They were pretty mesmerizing.

Another section of the exhibit was devoted to textiles made out of waste from the silk making process. They were austerely elegant.

We then wandered upstairs and were both completely captivated by the room full of architectural models.

Some seem to have been made as souvenirs of trips abroad, like the domed building made out of ivory.  The some, particularly the stair cases, seem to have been architectural models made for client approval of details of commissioned buildings.

We were both completely smitten with this double staircase.

We then moved on to an exhibit of  20th century design for every day objects. This is exactly the sort of exhibit that makes my heart sing. 

I loved this outboard motor. At first glance I thought it was milk shake machine.  I assume that a milk shake machine of that era would probably not look all that different.

My nephew is less of a fan of modernist design than I am, but we both loved this tea set.

My nephew was not a fan of this vanity. All of the circles made me fall in love.

Speaking of circles, this TV set was great.

I loved how weirdly anthropomorphic this chair is. It looks like you are sitting inside your obese aunt.

Recently this fabric showed up in the background of a TV show set some time in the mid century. I can't remember the show, but this fabric  is unforgettable.

We wandered through some rooms with the collections of the Hewett sisters.Here are a few things I particularly liked.

My nephew was completely enchanted by this faux candlestick with a computer generated flame. 

We walked south towards the Met, I got distracted by some beautiful late afternoon shadows of shrubbery against one of the buildings along Fifth Avenue.

We then walked home through Central P.ark