A few weeks ago I was walking down the end of East Main Street when I realized that I had yet to interview Ms. Gwenno James or even step into her Beacon clothing boutique for a quick hello. This would have to be remedied I thought to myself.
The first thing I noticed when I entered Ms. James store was the vibrancy of the colors of her clothes. Playful woodland greens and deep floral blues seemed to inhabit every usable inch of space within the studio creating, giving the impression of being lost outside, perhaps in a Welsh meadow which Ms. James used to delight in as a child. The entire space just exudes a wonderfully inviting and enticing aura; and the clothes ain't half bad either. But I digress.
Keenan Boyd: First of all I wanted to congratulate you on your store’s two year anniversary! Tell our readers a little bit about yourself. Are you a native Beaconite? How did you come to Beacon originally?
Gwenno James: Thank you! I was delighted to celebrate the store’s 2 year anniversary in July.
I am happy to consider myself a Beaconite, having now lived here for about seven years. I am originally from Wales. I studied fashion design in London and later traveled from London to New York, where I worked as a textile designer for American brands such as Calvin Klein, Victoria Secret and West Elm.
My husband and I met in NYC and after a few years we were looking to buy our own place. During our home search we came across a Beacon house listing within the Brooklyn real estate section online. We drove to Beacon that weekend, and during our visit we both felt that Beacon would be a good fit for us.
KB: How did you first become interested in fashion and creating clothing?
GJ: During high school, I had a passionate and thorough sewing teacher who voluntarily held a sewing club during lunch break. She taught me how to sew and encouraged me as I explored making and designing my own clothes. I am very grateful for her instruction and mentorship. I was also sponsored by the Laura Ashley company during my college fashion degree and during that time I learned a lot about textiles and manufacturing, which was very inspirational.
KB: All of your clothes are made from your own designs and then hand dyed and hand printed; this seems to be a wonderfully antiquated way to create clothing but one that seems to be sorely needed in the fashion landscape today. Do you ever feel that you could produce clothing in the industrial sense or is that completely out of the question?
GJ: I have often explored this question myself and in the past I have used more industrial methods to produce my designs. However, what I have discovered over time is that I enjoy working with traditional and historic textile techniques such as silk screening, hand dyeing and marbling and my customers are responding well to this unique, one of a kind quality in the designs. Vibrant colors can be produced by mixing dyes and printing /painting fabric by hand and this method allows for spontaneity and artistic flow. With this approach, I can offer custom fabrics and colors at the store to complement the individual, as well as custom fitting and garment design.
KB: During your July 12th event Uniquely You, you touched on how nature continues to be a recurring source of inspiration for your artwork and your clothing. I love the vibrancy and life that your clothes bring and their imagery conjures pictures of radiant fields of flowers and lush vegetation. Have your clothes always retained this aesthetic quality or have you transitioned into this current style over time?
GJ: Thank you – it’s great to hear your feedback! Nature continues to inspire me, especially since I moved to the Hudson Valley. As I walk my dog along the river path I notice the beauty and changes in nature season after season and I often pick up leaves and feathers as I go, which later become silk screen images for my fabric patterns. The artistic community in Beacon also inspires me. I started painting canvases when I moved to Beacon and I now translate some of these painting techniques onto fabric. So I am continually learning and exploring...
KB: So what’s next and your store Ms.James?
GJ: I am working on Fall designs and colors….orange, plum, chocolate, royal blue and turquoise…on fabrics such as velvet – for scarves as well as clothing. I created many custom garments for weddings over the summer, for mother of the bride, bride and wedding guests so I will continue to offer custom designs for special occasions such as these. I recently joined a group of professionals in the Hudson Valley who offer boutique, artisanal services for events and weddings called the Hive Event Collective.
Thanks so much for coming by Keenan!
Gwenno James is the founder, owner, and operator of Gwenno James Fashion and Fabric Designs here in our own Beacon, NY. Everyone at Beaconstreets.com wishes her the best in her endeavors and her dreams.
Something Else: A Free Jazz Jam kicks off tonight at Quinn's!
Like most Monday's these days there will be jazz at Quinn's...
Tonight however, breaking with the usual jazz fare, there will be a Free Jazz Jam starting at 8 PM that will be curated, hosted, and star local jazz musician and educator Chris Kelsey.
Focusing on improvisation and spontaneous creativity Kelsey's Something Else Jam is hoping to make Quinn's the center of the Jazz universe and we couldn't be happier.
More details about this now weekly event can be found at the link below on Quinn's Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/events/1485634558322230/
Ember Schrag is playing with Debbie Schwartz tonight at Quinn's. You should definitely go.
Ember Schrag is a singer and guitarist hailing from the plains of Nebraska whose unassuming and quaint style is evocative of the work of other artists such as Laura Veirs. She also happens to be playing a show tonight at Quinn's starting at 8:30.
Her work feels like a long walk into the hinterland with autumn nipping at your heels and the deadly promise of winter beckoning just behind. A feeling we at this point are all too familiar with. Check out the link below to see what I mean. It's the official video for her song "Sutherland."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zXnV1-mB10
I would highly recommend going to this show.
Although frost-bitten and weary from a long, dark, winter we can find solace in this siren from the west.
We can all huddle in the bar together tonight, letting her voice remind us of the impermanence of the seasons, and how the inevitable will happen. The sun will return, and we will be free from winter's bonds again if only for a short while.
Until then at least the music and the whisky is a good deterrent from the Seasonal Affective Disorder that is ravaging my body. I'll see you there.
Tenbrooks Molly is going to play some real Country Music tonight at Dogwood.
New York's own Tenbrooks Molly is slated to pick and strum some down home country tonight at Dogwood!
The show starts at 7:30 but you should probably mosey on in a little earlier than that to catch Dogwood's happy-hour food and drink specials. They run from 5-7 PM on Thursdays.
It's just a hunch, but I think some chicken wings and some country music are going to appear in my near future.
Below is the link for the facebook event page which has some cool background info and biography on the group. See you there.
The Beacon Pantry’s grand opening is going to occur all day on Saturday, the 22nd!
In addition to a wine tasting in the late afternoon, Beacon Pantry is offering raffle tickets to anyone with a purchase above $10 dollars. The raffle will conclude at some point in the evening and winners will be contacted to collect their prizes; anything from fig-spread to their excellent cheeses or a medley of everything in between!
They are also excited to announce the creation of their frequent cheese buyer’s club: a punch card system where every ten purchases of their fine cheeses yields a free cheese purchase!
So come on down to Beacon Pantry on Saturday, the 22nd and experience the meaty, nutty, dairy-filled bliss that Beacon Pantry is more than equipped to provide!
Along with the world our town is constantly evolving.
Rather than being sheltered and destitute, huddling up against our small peak at the end of Highlands we stand as a precipice and indeed veritable, (excuse the pun), beacon. We are a beacon to those who are seeking the solace of a quickly growing dynamic community, one that thrives on inclusivity and diversity.
When you consider the things we were missing in Beacon before these two showed up I think that a Curated Vintage Clothing Boutique, (say that ten times fast), was definitely on the list. Enter two starry eyed youngsters from Brooklyn, add a dash of fervent reverence for late 20th Century Americana and voila', you have American Gypsy Vintage.
As a member of the Millennial generation, I, like most of my counterparts are drawn to nostalgic relics of yesteryear. Grinning and drooling like an idiot, enchanted by the inherent cultural significance and innate charm that seems to pour out of these iconographic monoliths; when confronted with their beauty it is all I can do to not swoon.
Clothes, like other artifacts one might obtain, are patch-worn curios that express opinions from days, and years long past. They say, I was here. This was my identity and fuck you if you can't understand me. I think that our newest boutique's owners possess the same sentimental nature for their clothing, and wear those colors proudly and defiantly on their sleeves.
Their interview was a pleasant discourse over their discovery of Beacon, the difference between curated boutiques and consignment, and the influences that led to their part in the fashion community of New York today.
Keenan Boyd: So I'm here talking to the proud owners of American Gypsy Vintage, our town's newest curated, vintage clothing store: Nicole Alyse and Cabot Bramhall. So you both are from Goshen, Connecticut, but you just moved here from Brooklyn. How do you feel about the area now that you’ve relocated, what does it mean to have a business here in Beacon for you?
Cabot Bramhall: Oh, it's great. I mean this is our first business. This is our first store. She's been doing this for awhile, but not with a storefront business. It's great to finally have the freedom to have total control over her own stuff.
Nicole Alyse: We've been doing this online, so it's nice to have a huge inventory as opposed to having maybe like a hundred things online and then going really quickly. So it's nice to have a space where people can come in and really touch the clothes. Try them on and stuff as opposed to just ordering them online.
KB: So what can you tell me about your online business?
NA: Well we're launching the website today or tomorrow, but before that I've been selling clothes online like this since I was sixteen. I've constantly had things for sale on Etsy.com, on Ebay, my own website, but with my last job, I had a close the site because I was their vintage buyer, I couldn't be selling vintage and doing theirs as well, so yeah.We're big into social media.
CB: It's just great. Being your own boss is the most liberating thing ever, and everyone in Beacon has been so welcoming, all the owners of the other small businesses have been so encouraging. Everyone's super supportive of each other. It's a great community. It's also a great art community.
KB: What's not to like right? Hell yeah. So this is the obvious question, Why a vintage clothing boutique? You've been doing it forever, so it's your passion right?
NA: Yeah, I mean we have a lot of new things too. I work with a lot of current brands because of my personal fashion blog, so we do have a lot of the bigger brands, and things from this season will be in the store as well, but we mostly focus on vintage obviously.
KB: Tell me about your blog.
NA: It's just a personal fashion blog. I started working on it when I was in the city, so I'm known as more of NYC fashion blogger, but even with the relocation I still do stuff in the city with different brands.
KB: Well, let me rephrase the question in another way, why fashion? Why were you drawn to clothes? Both of you guys.
CB: Well, she's the talent behind the buying. (laughs.)
KB: (laughs.) Word.
NA: Not necessarily, he definitely helps out as far as Men's clothes because that's something that I don't necessarily have a stronger grasp on. I've just been doing Woman's stuff for so long.
CB: You're still pretty good with Men's.
NA: No, but he helps though. My last job though he took such a strong interest when I went on buying trips for my past employer, it just became something that both of us liked doing together, and it just really worked out.
KB: So how long have you guy's been working together now?
CB: Well, the store has been in our minds for...well she's known that she wants to open up a store for years. However, this particular spot, we started thinking about opening about nine months ago. We came up here originally for my mom's birthday, just passing through and loved it.
NA: Yeah we came on a Second Saturday, and we were just walking around and we said, 'Oh my god! This town is so lively!'
CB: Yeah, it was like midnight or something, and we were like, 'what is with this little town just popping?"
NA: Yeah! And we were like, we have to come here! We didn't see the other vintage stores, we kind of just saw their half of Main Street, and we just thought, 'Oh this would be a perfect spot for it!"
KB: Do you guys offer consignment like Blackbird Attic down the street? Tell me more about your business model?
NA: At the moment were not doing consignment. We hand pick everything that we have in here, just to keep a certain aesthetic that we want our brand to be. You know? And this way the customer always has a certain idea of what they're coming here for, we want to always have denim, we always want to have leather jackets, vintage t-shirts. Eventually we might offer some kind of consignment if it's something that fits into our aesthetic.
KB: Right. The only reason I ask is because most boutiques here offer consignment, but no big deal.
CB: We'd love to do it sometime down the road, but right now it's a matter of space too. LIke we don't have space to put consignment up.
KB: Right. Gotcha.
CB: We have stuff that's still sitting upstairs in our apartment waiting to come down.
NA: I do think that there's a huge difference between a consignment shop and a curated vintage boutique, only because you have a certain image, where with consignment you kind of have a mix of everything, which is great because you could hit more audiences, but I feel that we would rather stick to our aesthetic.
KB: Makes sense to me. I love the vibe of your store, it exudes a sort of Pan-American pop-cultural nostalgia that makes my skin itch. How would you describe your own relationship with your own personal fashion sense or style? What do you think clothes say about an individual?
NA: mmmm..
KB: It's a big question.
NA: Yeah, I was like, I'm gonna have to re-read that again! (laughs.)
KB: (laughs.)
CB: I like your description, I like to think of it as sort of Americana, with a lot of history and a lot of eclectic styles all around.
NA: A lot of different eras.
CB: Yeah, part of the reason we incorporated the word gypsy into the name is because the word incorporates travel, and wanderlust, and like, a mystique.
NA: Yeah.
KB: So there's notes of cultural relevance that you try to find pliable within the brand and the theme of the store, right?
NA: Yeah, a lot of them bring back certain memories, yeah even like an old band t-shirt or old movie t-shirts. Simpsons memorabilia, you know? Just random things that people can come into the store and instantly relate to, and they'll say, 'Oh my god, I loved this when I was growing up!'
CB: I think like the core of what the store is that we have kind of like a vintage rock n' roll style. LIke kind of what you always liked about your dad's style Nicole.
NA: Yeah. Yeah. My dad was in bands so growing up I always looked through all his photo albums, and like pictures of him in the city wearing leather jackets, big hair, dirty t-shirts, that type of thing, so it definitely influenced my personal style growing up. Then that just kind of evolved into my love of fashions from the seventies, the eighties, the nineties grunge stuff, and I love it all.
KB: Who did he play with? Who's your father?
NA: Well my father is just my father. He's not a name you would probably recognize, but he played in bands with people like Steven Tyler, and a bunch of other people.
KB: Oh, cool. Alright. I know you just opened but do you have any big plans for the spring? Promotions for Second Saturday?
CB: We just opened on a Second Saturday, and were not expecting that much of a crowd but it was huge.
NA: We actually stayed open until 10:30 because there were still tons of people in here shopping. I guess one of major plans would be to actually get a sign outside. We've done pretty good without even having a sign, so that's great.
KB: The word of mouth is like, 'Oh they're across from Max's,' and now they know where you are.
NA: Yeah. Easy enough.
CB: I don't want to like promise any promotions, but for locals I would like to give a discount, also for like Winter stuff that we're gonna have to move out, that doesn't sell online we'll probably put it up on sale.
KB: Yeah, it's getting to the end of the Winter.
CB: Yeah, nobody's gonna' want to buy a Winter coat in Spring.
NA: Maybe we'll have like a band or something. We want to have a proper store opening party.
KB: Oh really? That would be sweet.
NA: We have a few friends that might come up from the city and and do a small show.
KB: Fit a band up in here? What like a two-piece?
NA: Yeah, it's like a duo, dj-set kind of thing.
KB: You could definitely fit that in here. That would be sick. Well Nicole Alyse and Cabot Bramhall thank you so much for your time, and welcome to Beacon.
NA/CB: Thanks.
NIcole Alyse and Cabot Bramhall and the enigmatic and mysterious gypsies behind Beacon, New York's newest curated vintage clothing boutique, American Gypsy Vintage. For all things Americana and gloriously nostalgic give them a ring. If you need me I'll be at home sewing together this old jean jacket I found in the attic. All of us over at beaconstreets.com wish them all the best in their endeavors and their dreams.
