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    At Los Angeles Galleries, Savoring the Waning Days of Summer

    During an often quiet season in the art world, several outstanding solo shows and one group show offer a feast for the eye and the mind.Rick Lowe’s “Cavafy Remains,” 2024, acrylic on canvas, in the group exhibition “Social Abstraction” at Gagosian Beverly Hills.via Rick Lowe and Gagosian; Photo by Thomas DubrockThe traditional summer lull in the art gallery calendar typically spurs a rash of phoned-in group shows, a chance to drag unsold works out of storage and repackage them under limp catchall themes. Not so much this month in Los Angeles, where several eye-catching solo exhibitions feature artists who are overdue for a moment in the sun.On the evidence of these shows, there’s no single dominant trend in art right now, but rather a general sense of permission to take seriously a broad spectrum of artists and positions, especially those of older generations. In this late-summer heat, it’s a welcome respite.‘Magdalena Suarez Frimkess: The Finest Disregard’Through Jan. 25. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 5905 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles; 323-857-6000; lacma.org.Top to bottom: “Minnie Mouse Wearing Venice Canals Dress,” 2004; “Minnie Mouse Wearing Pineapple and Palm Tree Pattern,” 2005; “Minnie Mouse in a White Dress With Red Polka Dots,” 2007; “Minnie Mouse in a Green Dress With Pink Polka Dots,” 2007; and “Minnie Mouse in a Pink Dress,” undated.via Magdalena Suarez Frimkess and Los Angeles County Museum of ArtAt 95, the Venezuelan-born Magdalena Suarez Frimkess has waited a long time for her first museum retrospective. Trained in Chile as a sculptor, she came to the United States on a fellowship in 1962 and met Michael Frimkess, a classical ceramist. They were soon married, and settled in Los Angeles. After he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, she began applying her Pop-inflected imagery onto his elegant vessels, painting them with colored glaze.This exhibition of ceramics, furniture, paintings and drawings at LACMA, curated by José Luis Blondet, takes its title from an astute review in Art in America by Paul Harris: “The work of Magdalena Suarez Frimkess — the most daring sculptor working in Chile — is distinguished by the finest disregard for whatever is supposed to be so.” We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Antique Wall Tapestries Are Back. Here’s Where to Buy.

    Leafy antique wall hangings are having a resurgence in the design world, showing up in even the most modern rooms.Picture a tapestry hanging on a wall and the setting is likely a rambling manor house. Lately, however, ornate European examples have been appearing in less expected places, including contemporary Manhattan apartments. “Just as they did in castles in Belgium in the 15th century, tapestries provide an enormous amount of visual impact, warmth and artistry,” says the New York-based interior designer Billy Cotton, 42, who recently installed one as a stand-in for a headboard in an eclectic apartment on the Upper East Side. “They bring something unique that art or wallpaper just doesn’t.”European tapestry, as an art form, dates back at least as far as the Middle Ages, when intricate, outsize weavings depicting everything from wildlife scenes to biblical stories were woven by hand on looms using wool, silk and even gold and silver thread. During their first surge in desirability, between the 15th and 18th centuries, they were found exclusively in the grand abodes of royals and aristocrats — not only because of their prohibitive prices but because of the vast wall space required. Thick and dense, they also acted as insulation, making them ideal for drafty castles. (Henry VIII was a fan.)According to Jim Ffrench, 60, a director at the gallery Beauvais Carpets in Manhattan, antique wall hangings remained as expensive as important oil paintings and other fine art until around the time of the Great Depression, when they fell out of fashion and lost value. “The concept of them being a decorative or secondary art form is very much a mid-20th-century conceit,” he says. “But the upside is that, today, even the best tapestries in the world are still cheaper than a Basquiat.” While that’s a high bar — and figurative woven scenes are relatively rare and priced accordingly — simple verdure tapestries, which depict lush landscape scenes, and fragments of larger pieces can often be found for less than $1,000.In the New York City bedroom of the interior designer Billy Cotton, a verdure tapestry that he found at a Paris flea market acts as a headboard.Blaine DavisA rare wool-and-silk panel woven in Brussels in the early 1500s and depicting a betrothal scene hangs on the wall at the Manhattan showroom of the textile dealer Vojtech Blau.John Bigelow Taylor“The palette and scale of tapestries can lend a room a beautiful openness because, oftentimes, they have an interesting sense of depth in their compositions,” says Adam Charlap Hyman, 34, a co-founder of the New York- and Los Angeles-based architecture and design firm Charlap Hyman & Herrero. In the living room of his New York City apartment, an early 18th-century verdure tapestry — inherited from his grandmother and made in Aubusson, a French town famed for its weaving — takes up almost an entire wall, framing a curved 1970s sofa by the German designer Klaus Uredat.The Manhattan-based architect and designer Giancarlo Valle, 42, often incorporates tapestries with nature scenes — known as cartoons — into his projects because, he says, “they’re like lenses into another world.” Recently he hung a 14-foot-high 17th-century Flemish piece above a midcentury chest of drawers in a client’s otherwise minimalist New York apartment. The piece, which he acquired from an estate, is part of a four-panel set, other panels of which hang in the palatial English manor houses Holkham Hall in Norfolk and Mamhead in Devonshire. “I think their rise in popularity fits in with the larger trends we’re seeing in the art world now for figurative paintings, real life scenes and historical-looking works,” he says, adding that “tapestries are great for rooms that need a big storytelling element or have a very large wall.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    A Lakeside Restaurant Reopens in Paris’s Bois de Boulogne

    Plus: a Pennsylvania wellness retreat, whimsical wallpaper and more recommendations from T Magazine.Covet ThisA New Wallpaper Collection Inspired by Field FrolickingLeft: Block Shop sells its textiles as well as a selection of books, dishes and jewelry at its shop in Atwater Village, Los Angeles. Right: Block Shop’s Peony wallpaper in Onyx.From left: Laure Joliet for Block Shop; Ye Rin Mok for Block ShopHopie Stockman Hill and Grier Stockman grew up in an old farmhouse in a sylvan pocket of New Jersey. They played in wheat fields, craggy apple orchards and dense forests; built birdhouses and painted murals. The sisters’ childhood, spent merging art with nature, inspired their latest wallpaper collection from Block Shop, their textile, art and design studio, which combines a breezy California aesthetic with Indian printing and weaving techniques. The seven new patterns, which are printed on paper, fiber and grass cloth, include a peony motif that’s a homage to the blooms their mother grew, while also referencing the Austrian Wiener Werkstätte designer Dagobert Peche. “We envisioned an Anne Bancroft-esque grande dame with a sky-high collection of art books, listening to ‘Madama Butterfly’ while harvesting her beets,” says Stockman Hill, the CEO and creative director of the studio. “These are the wallpapers you find in her home.” The Block Shop store, which opened in Los Angeles’s Atwater Village neighborhood this past December, further extends the sisters’ canvas with a harmonious blend of color and texture. A bronze snail door handle greets you on the way in, while the shelves are brimming with Apuglian splatterware dishes, rare books on décor and semi-fine jewelry, as well as the brand’s signature textiles. From $75 per yard, blockshoptextiles.com.Stay HereA Guesthouse in Rome From the Founders of Chez DedeLeft: one of the two bedrooms at Superattico Monserrato, a new short-term rental apartment in Rome owned by the founders of the shop Chez Dede. Right: the living room of the apartment, where a Venini chandelier hangs over a ’60s table from Belgium and Cesca chairs from the ’70s.Daria ReinaThe Rome boutique Chez Dede, founded in 2011 by the design duo Daria Reina and Andrea Ferolla, is filled with antiques and artworks, as well as silk-screened tote bags and limited-edition collaborations: wicker lamps created with Atelier Vime and enameled brass jewelry inspired by playing cards with the Italian jewelry designer Allegra Riva. When the penthouse apartment in the same building as the store came up for rent in 2019, the couple and their team decided to create a suite that would further bring visitors into their world. After they got city permits in early 2023, it took them about a year to renovate the two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment, now named Superattico Monserrato. They put in sliding doors, updated the kitchen with steel counters and glossy black walls and added dozens of theatrical Chez Dede touches: 17th-century carved wooden columns, a wall-size 18th-century tapestry, drawings by the 93-year-old Rome-based artist Isabella Ducrot and bed linens from their own collection. Early this year, Reina and Ferolla began renting the flat to a select few. “It’s really about sharing our lifestyle and our taste,” Reina says — and about imparting their tips for Rome: The Chez Dede team has a space at the front of the apartment, so at any point guests can stick their heads in and ask for favorite vintage shops and cafes. Superattico Monserrato also hosts occasional events: Up next is a trunk show with the designer Sara Beltran of jewelry brand Dezso, on May 9. Email superattico@chezdede.com to book; about $1,900 a night, minimum three nights.Eat HereA Parisian Restaurant With a Tasting Menu Served in the Vegetable GardenChalet des Îles, a longstanding building on an island in Paris’s Bois de Boulogne park, has been renovated and reopened as a new restaurant and bar.© Julien de GasquetFor the past 167 years, Parisians have escaped urban life by taking a short boat ride to Chalet des Îles, a wooden structure on a small island in Bois de Boulogne park. In 1857, Empress Eugénie de Montijo transported a cabin from Switzerland to Paris and set it on the tree-filled island in Lac Inférieur as a draw for city dwellers who needed a dose of nature. Destroyed by fire in 1920, the structure was rebuilt with less-charming concrete. Now, the famous chalet and its restaurant have been completely redesigned by the French architect Nicolas Laisné and will reopen this month. The use of hand-carved, honey-colored timber scales in the cladding on the main facade recalls the original Swiss building. The main dining room and its covered balcony open onto lakeside views, while the bar extends onto a ground-level terrace. A custom white-and-green carpet in the main restaurant reflects the colors of the lake outside, and raw-edge wooden tables nod to the forest. Visitors have the option of dining privately in the chalet’s vegetable garden: The reservation-only experience, titled Les Tables du Potager, features a five-course, plant-focused tasting menu by chef Pierre Chomet. Meals in the dining room feature dishes like asparagus with mimosa eggs and Iberian ham, and shrimp tartare in a pad Thai broth, inspired by Chomet’s six years cooking in Bangkok. The restaurant also plans to serve a brunch buffet on Sundays. Chalet des Îles opens April 24, chalet-des-iles.com.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    This Was Village Life in Britain 3,000 Years Ago

    Three millenniums ago, a small, prosperous farming community briefly flourished in the freshwater marshes of eastern England. The inhabitants lived in a clutch of thatched roundhouses built on wooden stilts above a channel of the River Nene, which empties into the North Sea. They wore clothes of fine flax linen, with pleats and tasseled hems; bartered for glass and amber beads imported from places as far-flung as present-day Iran; drank from delicate clay poppyhead cups; dined on leg of boar and honey-glazed venison, and fed table scraps to their dogs.Within a year of its construction, this prehistoric idyll met a dramatic end. A catastrophic fire tore through the compound; the buildings collapsed and the villagers fled, abandoning their garments, tools and weapons. Everything, including the porridge left in cooking pots, crashed through the burning wicker floors into the thick, sticky reed beds below and stayed there. Eventually, the objects sank, hidden and entombed, in more than six feet of oozing peat and silt. The river gradually moved course away from the encampment, but the debris remained intact for nearly 3,000 years, preserving a record of daily life at the end of Britain’s Bronze Age, from 2500 B.C. to 800 B.C.That frozen moment in time is the subject of two monographs published Tuesday by Cambridge University. Based on a 10-month excavation of what is now known as Must Farm Quarry, a submerged and superbly preserved settlement in the shadow of a potato-chip factory 75 miles north of London, the studies are as detailed as a forensic investigation report of a crime scene. One paper, a site synthesis, runs to 323 pages; the other, for specialists, is nearly 1,000 pages longer.“This didn’t feel like archaeology,” said Mark Knight, the project director and one of the paper’s authors. “At times, excavating the site felt slightly rude and intrusive, as if we had turned up after a tragedy, picked through someone’s possessions and got a glimpse of what they did one day in 850 B.C.”The sharpened tip of a post; an amber bead; an axehead in situ.Cambridge Archaeological UnitEvidence for life in Britain’s Bronze Age has traditionally come from fortified and religious sites that are often found on high, dry landscapes. Most of the clues come as pottery, flint tools and bones. “Generally we have to work with small bits and pieces and barely visible remains of houses, and read between the lines,” said Harry Fokkens, an archaeologist at Leiden University. Convincing anyone that such places were once thriving settlements takes a little imagination.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    At New York’s Warren Street Hotel, Where Pattern Meets Pattern

    This Manhattan project is the latest from the British designer Kit Kemp, who is known for her fanciful interiors.Despite being one of the most coveted residential neighborhoods in Manhattan, TriBeCa has long had a dearth of beautiful places to stay. That changed this month when the London-based Firmdale Hotels opened its third New York property, the 57-room Warren Street Hotel. However, unlike the red brick structures that surround it, this building is painted a bright cerulean. TriBeCa offers just the right mix of “artists, designers, families and a sprinkling of Hollywood glamour,” says Kit Kemp, Firmdale’s co-founder and creative director, whose interior design studio also has its own furniture and accessories line. “We wanted to build something that contributes to this narrative in a bold and exciting way.”Inside, Kemp’s signature aesthetic — all colorful, mismatched patterns, whimsical Pierre Frey wallpaper and dramatic sculptures (a monumental 21-foot-long steel, bronze and plaster piece by the British artist Gareth Devonald Smith looms above the bar) — defines the public areas, along with pieces by some of her other favorite artists and craftspeople. A tapestry made from recycled paper beads by the Ugandan mixed-media artist Sanaa Gateja hangs near the main entrance, and the Argentine designer Cristián Mohaded’s sculptural basket towers appear throughout the lobby.A ground-floor restaurant will serve dishes such as heirloom carrots with pistachio gremolata in a Thai coconut curry, and a sunchoke risotto with chanterelles, as well as afternoon tea. Outdoors, the Brooklyn-based Brook Landscape has designed meadowlike vistas on the terraces of some suites, with a variety of grasses, cherry trees and ferns. For Kemp, bringing nature into an urban environment was perhaps the most rewarding aspect of the project: “You can sit in the drawing room of a suite overlooking a garden, or even in the bath, watching the flowers grow.” Rooms from $925 a night, firmdalehotels.com. More

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    A Paris Hotel Mixing Minimalism and Opulence

    Plus: an exhibition of male nudes, vibrantly patterned rugs and more recommendations from T Magazine.STay HereThis New Getaway Combines Japanese and French DesignThe interior design of Hotel Hana, on the edge of Little Tokyo in Paris, blends Japanese restraint and maximalist French flourishes.Left: Romain Ricard. Right: Robin Le FebvreSeveral years ago, the hotelier Nicolas Saltiel stood in front of an office building on the northern edge of the Japanese quarter in Paris. The early 20th-century Haussmann-style block sat on a corner, so he could tell from the sidewalk that the light would be good. It was in the Second Arrondissement and, from the top floors, he guessed, you might be able to see the dome of Sacré-Cœur in Montmartre. (You can.) “I knew if I could manage to buy it, this place would make a perfect, intimate hotel,” Saltiel says.Saltiel’s company, Adresses Hotels, owns five other small hotels in Paris, each of them with a distinct look and atmosphere. For Hotel Hana and its 26 bedrooms, the architect and designer Laura Gonzalez chose to highlight the hotel’s proximity to Little Tokyo, which includes the Japanese shops and restaurants on Rue Sainte-Anne, a five-minute walk away. “The source of inspiration is Japonisme, an artistic movement that emerged during the Belle Époque period,” says Gonzalez. Japanese building techniques and materials, like paneled partitions, straw walls and lacquered furniture, appear alongside French adornments like velvet headboards and rugs made by Pierre Frey. At the bar, you can order an egg sando and wash it down with a glass of Burgundy. Rooms from about $425, hotelhana-paris.com.See ThisAn Artist’s Many Views of the Male BodyPaul Cadmus’s “The Nap” (1952).Collection of the Tobin Theatre Arts Fund, courtesy of the McNay Art Museum, San Antonio“The Male Nude,” an exhibition of the artist Paul Cadmus’s paintings and drawings, opens this week at Manhattan’s DC Moore Gallery. It’s the artist’s first major solo show in over 20 years. Though he gained acclaim beginning in the 1930s with works like “The Fleet’s In!” (which also stirred controversy for its particularly callipygian depiction of American sailors engaging in debauchery), he painted just 135 canvases over the nearly eight-decade span of his career, sometimes only completing one a year. “We don’t paint for stock,” Cadmus used to say, according to the gallerist Bridget Moore, who worked with him for 15 years. His paintings contain symbolic and satirical details: In 1951’s “Manikins,” two (presumably male) wooden figurines are shown locked in an embrace atop a stack of books; close inspection reveals the topmost volume is a copy of André Gide’s anonymously published “Corydon,” in which the French author argued that homosexuality is a natural condition. In his paintings, Cadmus never repeated subject matter or included the same character twice. He was more prolific with his drawings, which are imbued with a sense of reverence for the human form. This show highlights his serially numbered nudes, most of which are drawn in crayon on hand-toned paper. Works from the 1930s to 1990s are included, offering viewers plenty of angles from which to appreciate Cadmus’s undulating bodies. “The Male Nude” is on view at DC Moore Gallery, New York, from Feb. 8 to March 16, dcmooregallery.com.Covet ThisBright Rugs Inspired by a Scandinavian SculptorThe Nordic Knots x Campbell-Rey II Collection in Folding Ribbon (left) and Garden Maze (right), photographed inside the Thorvaldsen Museum in Copenhagen.Robbie LawrenceWhen the London-based design studio Campbell-Rey first collaborated with the textile company Nordic Knots in 2021, the result was a collection of color-drenched rugs that paid playful homage to Gustavian design elements, referencing the Swedish style popular in the late 1700s. Charlotte Rey, a co-founder of Campbell-Rey, wondered at the time if their creations were too exuberant for those accustomed to the Stockholm-based brand’s typically minimalist aesthetic. But the response was enthusiastic enough that, three years later, the two are joining forces again.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    The Revolutionary Power of a Skein of Yarn

    Not long ago, Michelle Obama posted a black-and-white photo of herself on Instagram, cozy in an armchair, a nearby side table displaying an adorable baby pic of Malia and Sasha. She is barefoot, dressed in wide-legged jeans and a satin shirt, smiling widely as she looks down … at her knitting. “Every time I tell people how much I love to knit,” she writes in the caption, “They seem so surprised!”And I thought, why?I suspect it’s because knitters, unlike Mrs. Obama, are presumed to be aging ungracefully: prim, elderly (probably white) ladies rocking away on the porch in cultural irrelevance. Before I refute that — yarn lovers come in all ages, genders, sexualities and races — I want to ask, even if it were true, so what? The dismissal, the reflexive derision of women from midlife onward — especially if we stop chasing social media standards of beauty — is a nasty form of ageist sexism.Besides, that imagined innocuousness can be a strength, even a superpower. Knitting is considered a “craft,” one you begin by “casting on,” evoking spells and witchery, a kind of practical magic. What greater sorcery is there, really, than making something, whether turning raw fiber to thread or raw flour to bread or engaging in the ultimate creative act: conjuring new humans from nowhere at all?Our needles have also been a sharp political tool, wielded to fight injustice, to express both patriotism and protest, especially when other outlets were forbidden. No matter how you ended up feeling about those pink pussyhats, it was no accident that women’s first collective act of dissent after the election of President Donald Trump was to knit.Back in the days of the American Revolution, women’s boycotts of British cloth in favor of “homespun,” and their defiant public “spinning bees” were at least as instrumental in the fight for independence as the spilling of all that tea. Molly “Old Mom” Rinker, one of the era’s fabled spies, reportedly tucked bits of information about British troop movements into balls of yarn. Who would suspect an aging matron, placidly knitting socks at a scenic overlook, of tossing message-laced skeins to the patriots? Knitting’s benign reputation allowed her to subvert the very conventions she appeared to uphold.The French had their “tricoteuses,” which translates to women knitters (they have a word for that!), particularly those who, during the Reign of Terror, sat before the guillotines bearing grim witness to public executions. You may recall Madame Defarge from “A Tale of Two Cities,” whose stitches formed a Reaper’s roster of the condemned. Her real-life counterparts were equally complex, a mix of feminist hero and vengeful villain. Many (presumably savoring l’ironie) were said to knit liberty caps as the heads rolled: those red, conical hats with the point folded forward that represented freedom from tyranny. Marianne, a national symbol of France, is often depicted in a liberty cap. So, for reasons I cannot determine, is Papa Smurf.Sojourner Truth offered a different twist on yarn and femininity during the Civil War, posing for photographs with her knitting, a nod to her belief that education and industry were the key to her community’s advancement. Decades later, when troops in World War I were dying by the tens of thousands from an epidemic of trench foot, caused by persistently wet toes, it was knitters to the rescue. The best defense was to change your socks — a lot — but factories of the time couldn’t handle the load, so home crafters produced them. I’m not saying we won that war because of women’s knitting, but I’m not sure we would’ve won without it.Another activist first lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, was rarely without her knitting and began the Knit for Defense campaign during World War II. Similarly to Old Mom Rinker, female spies of the time used knitting as cover, one even parachuting behind enemy lines, then using her needles to transport secret code.Today’s public knitters — and crocheters — are arguably more radical, perhaps in part because making something with your own hands almost by definition pushes back against dehumanizing technology and consumer culture. Knitters have mobilized against nuclear proliferation and the decimation of coral reefs. They have made blankets to welcome refugees; crafted tiny sweaters to save oil spill-damaged penguins; knit “temperature scarves” whose rows and colors document climate change; stitched for racial justice; sent handmade uteri to Congress in support of abortion rights (an especially apt political statement, since knitting needles were notoriously used, to women’s peril, in back-alley abortions). During the second Iraq war, a knitter in Denmark swathed a tank in a massive, homey knit blanket. The Russian feminist punk group Pussy Riot famously masked their identities beneath brightly colored, knit balaclavas while performing songs such as “Putin’s Pissed Himself” and “Kill the Sexist.”Do such acts of “craftivism” ultimately make a difference? I can’t say. But I do believe that change starts with personal reflection, followed by connection to like-minded others, and, finally, engagement in repeated, targeted collective action. The conversations our projects inspire can jump-start that process, one stitch at a time.In that spirit, I’d like to see knitters, perhaps led by Mrs. Obama, next aim their needles at the fashion industry, pushing for the kind of large-scale overhaul here that is beginning in the European Union: an unprecedented series of measures addressing the catastrophic environmental and social impact involved in the making and disposal of our clothing. The goal by 2030 is for all textiles sold in that market to be, among other things, reparable, recyclable, often made from recycled fibers that are free from hazardous chemicals and produced with respect for labor rights.It’s a necessary start. Fashion is responsible for more greenhouse gasses than international flights and maritime shipping combined, not to mention a fifth of global plastics and trillions of microfibers: tiny plastic threads shed by clothing when laundered that have become one of the biggest threats to the ocean. Treatment of the industry’s largely female work force in Asia, long a human rights concern, has deteriorated so badly since the pandemic that some activists now refer to it as the “garment industrial trauma complex.” Not so pretty.This would be a natural fit for those who value the materials, skill and care that go into our garments. Besides, people who think about the ethics and planetary cost of what they put into their bodies ought to extend that “omnivore’s dilemma” to what they put onto them.Knitters might consider yarn-bombing the New York State Legislature (we like a little levity with our lobbying), where the recently-amended Fashion Act aims to hold large companies accountable for their environmental and labor practices. Or perhaps support the FABRIC Act, sponsored by Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, which includes increased safety and wage protections for American piece workers, for whom handicraft is decidedly not a luxury.So yes, knitting can be meditative, it can be relaxing, it may reduce vulnerability to dementia, anxiety and high blood pressure. It also results (if you’re lucky) in some pretty nice stuff. And maybe the demographic does still skew toward the older and the female. But why not embrace that?Because Michelle and the rest of us aging ladies? We don’t have to just sit and rock; we can rock it.Peggy Orenstein (@peggyorenstein) is the author of “Unraveling: What I Learned About Life While Shearing Sheep, Dyeing Wool, and Making the World’s Ugliest Sweater.”The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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    Colombia’s First Black Vice President Spotlights Afro-Caribbean Fashion

    The wardrobe of Francia Márquez, Colombia’s first Black vice president, is the creation of a young designer at the center of an Afro-Colombian fashion explosion.CALI, Colombia — At a premier fashion event in the coastal city of Buenaventura this year, a pair of towering models strutted down the boardwalk, one in a red minidress with a fluted top inspired by an open seashell and the other wearing a blue-and-gold gown fit for a modern queen.The models were Black and the fabrics imported from Africa — unusual for a major fashion show in Colombia. But what most distinguished them was the designer himself: Esteban Sinisterra Paz, a 23-year-old university student with no formal design training who is at the center of an Afro-Colombian fashion explosion.“Decolonization of the human being,” is the aim of his work, he said, along with showing the world an expansive view of “the elegance of identity.”Mr. Sinisterra is the man behind the wardrobe of Francia Márquez, an environmental activist and lawyer who on Sunday will become Colombia’s first Black vice president.The wardrobe of Francia Márquez, who on Sunday will become Colombia’s first Black vice president, is largely designed Mr. Sinisterra, a 23-year-old social work student with no formal design training who is at the center of an Afro-Colombian fashion explosion.Federico Rios for The New York TimesIn a nation where race and class often define a person’s status, Ms. Márquez, 40, has made a remarkable leap from profound poverty to the presidential palace, emerging as the voice of millions of poor, Black and Indigenous Colombians.In a matter of months, she has not only pushed racism and classism to the center of the national conversation, she has also revolutionized the country’s political aesthetic, rejecting starched shirts and suits in favor of a distinctly Afro-Colombian look that she calls a form of rebellion.Natural hair. Bold prints. Dresses that highlight her curves.But Ms. Márquez and Mr. Sinisterra are just the most visible ambassadors of an Afro-Colombian aesthetic boom that proponents say is part of a larger movement demanding greater respect for millions of Black Colombians.Mr. Sinisterra with some of the pieces that he uses to create a distinctly Afro-Colombian look.Nathalia Angarita for The New York TimesIn a nation where 40 percent of households live on less than $100 a month — a percentage that has grown during the pandemic — Afro-Colombians are among the poorest groups, with the regions where they predominate, including the Pacific Coast, some of the most neglected by generations of politicians.Officially, Black Colombians make up between 6 to 9 percent of the population. But many say that is an undercount that perpetuates a lack of recognition.“Colonization tried to erase Black people,” said Lia Samantha Lozano, 41, who began outfitting her hip-hop and reggae band, Voodoo Souljahs, in African fabrics more than a decade ago, positioning her as a pioneer in the movement.In 2014, she became the first Black woman with a runway show at Colombiamoda, the country’s biggest fashion event. Today, politically oriented Afro-descendant brands have proliferated on the internet, and in shops across Cali, a major hub of Afro-Colombian culture, with Black celebrities, models, politicians and activists increasingly using clothing as a political tool. And the Petronio Álvarez Festival, an annual celebration of Afro-Colombian culture that draws hundreds of thousands of people to Cali, has emerged as the movement’s fashion week. Ms. Lozano now sells a bright, hip-hop inspired line at a major shopping mall in the capital of Bogotá.“A big part of the plan was to make us feel ashamed of who we are, of our colors, of our culture, of our features,” she went on. “To wear this every day, not as ‘fashion,’ not to dress up for a special occasion, but as a way of life, as something you want to communicate every day — yes, it is political. And, yes, it is a symbol of resistance.”Mr. Sinisterra at a fashion show in Buenaventura with a model wearing one of his designs, which he called “Royal Imperialism.”Augusto GalloAmong the movement’s signatures are bright patterned fabrics called wax, which are wildly popular across West, East and Central Africa and famous for telling stories and sending messages through their pictures and designs. (Prints can celebrate everything from pop culture to religion and politics, featuring tubes of lipstick, the faces of religious figures or portraits of politicians and celebrities.)Afro-Colombian aesthetic often references nature — Mr. Sinisterra has a dress with sleeves like wings inspired by Colombia’s famous butterflies — and can incorporate elaborate beaded jewelry and woven bags by artists from Colombia’s many Indigenous communities.The movement’s leaders include not just Ms. Márquez, but also Emilia Eneyda Valencia Murraín, 62, a mentor of Mr. Sinisterra’s who in 2004 started Weaving Hope, a multiday celebration of Black hair in Cali.Emilia Eneyda Valencia Murraín, 62, is a mentor of Mr. Sinisterra’s.Nathalia Angarita for The New York TimesColombia’s sartorial moment is years, many would say centuries, in the making, drawing on activism in Latin America, Africa and the United States; the baggy street style of hip-hop and the sparkly astral vibes of Afrofuturism; the turbans of Colombian market women; the mermaid silhouettes of Senegal and Nigeria; and even the influence of Michelle Obama, who famously used clothing to make political statements.The aesthetic is also expansive and fluid, including everyday clothing — like tunics from the brand Baobab by Consuelo Cruz Arboleda — and showpieces like Mr. Sinisterra’s Royal Imperialism, a tight, ruffled strapless gown whose grandeur he said embodies the modern-day cultural empire that the descendants of Africa have constructed in the Colombian Pacific.“We are transforming the image that we have of power,” said Edna Liliana Valencia, 36, a popular Afro-Colombian journalist, poet and activist.Edna Liliana Valencia is an Afro-Colombian journalist, poet and activist.Nathalia Angarita for The New York TimesMr. Sinisterra is among this movement’s newest stars. Born into a poor family in the small town of Santa Bárbara de Iscuandé, near the Pacific Ocean, his family was forcibly displaced by armed men when he was 5, among the millions of Colombians victimized by the country’s decades-long internal conflict.In the nearby town of Guapi, and later in the port city of Buenaventura, Mr. Sinisterra learned to sew from his aunt and grandmother, whom he called “the designers of the neighborhood.”“Esteban African,” he said of his clothing line, “began out of a necessity to bring money home.”Mr. Sinisterra wanted to study fashion, but his father thought that was only for girls, so he entered university as a social work student.But he began building a name designing increasingly elaborate pieces for a growing list of customers, finding inspiration online and selling his work on Instagram and Facebook. Then, in 2019, Ms. Márquez called. She had been referred to him by a mutual friend and needed an outfit. Mr. Sinisterra is in his seventh of eight semesters at university. When he’s not in class, he sews the vice president’s outfits in a windowless room in his small apartment in Cali. His boyfriend, Andrés Mena, 27, is a former nurse who switched careers to become general manager of Esteban African.Mr. Sinisterra with his boyfriend, Andrés Mena, left.Nathalia Angarita For The New York TimesAmong the brand’s best known items are two pairs of earrings. One features the map of Colombia, etched with its 32 departments. A second looks like two gold orbs meant to evoke the mining pans Ms. Márquez used as a child miner in the mountains of Cauca, near the Pacific Coast, long before she became a household name.Ms. Márquez once slept on a dirt floor beside her siblings. She later worked as a live-in maid to support her children, went to law school and eventually won a prize known as the environmental Nobel.In an interview, she called Mr. Sinisterra’s work a critical part of her political identity. “He’s showing young people that they can succeed, using their talent, they can get ahead,” she said.Mr. Sinisterra has never been to Africa. A visit is his dream, along with studying fashion in Paris and “building a school where the children of the Pacific can have alternatives,” he said, “and their parents, unlike mine, will not think that sewing and cutting and making clothes is only for girls.”Today, he said, his father is proud of his work.Lately, he has been barraged by media and customer requests, and he manages his newfound fame by working around the clock.One day in July, barefoot and sweating, he laid a pair of fabrics on the floor, cut them freehand, then stitched them together using a new Jinthex sewing machine he’d bought with his now improving wages. He was making another dress for Ms. Márquez.On Election Day in June, he outfitted her in kente cloth, a Ghanaian print whose interlocking lines evoke basket weavings, to symbolize vote collection.Ms. Márquez wearing a kente cloth dress on Election Day in June.Federico Rios for The New York TimesThe dress had a ruffle down the front, representing the rivers in Ms. Márquez’s home region, and the jacket on her shoulders, all white, symbolized peace, he said, “in this country so torn up by political postures.”He’s made three outfits for inauguration day. “Whichever she chooses is fine with me,” he said.As he ironed the newly stitched piece, he said he was both excited and anxious about Ms. Márquez’s ascension to power.In the last few months, he has come to feel like a part of her political project, and she has made enormous promises to transform the country after decades of injustice.“The responsibility is going to grow,” he said.“My responsibility, Francia’s responsibility, backing this process so that the people — our people — don’t feel betrayed.” More