Live, Laugh, Viva Magenta

DEAR ANN:

I have a lot of costume jewelry from my mom and my grandmothers, mostly crystal and pearls and some kind of painted glass beads. I can tell it’s all good quality stuff but it’s just not my style. Is there some way I can enjoy them without dressing like my grandmother? And please don’t tell me to up-cycle it into artsy modern jewelry a la steampunk, because I don’t have the tools or skills for that, and steampunk is also not my style. I would take any other suggestions, though. Thank you.

DEAR READER:

Not only will I not send you running to the craft store with a shopping list of supplies and materials just so you can make a different version of jewelry you won’t wear, I’ll give you an option so thrifty and practical, your grandmother would be impressed.

Pack up the jewelry along with any random housewares you’ve ever been gifted but don’t really like. This might include but is not limited to: Candlesticks. Paperweights. Wall hangings commanding you and your houseguests to count your blessings. Wall hangings commanding you to live, laugh and love. Any vase from flowers previously delivered from a florist, and you knew without a doubt you’d never use for flowers or really anything else, but it was a nice glass vase and now you’re stuck. Wind chimes too cheap to make pleasing music, but also too nice to stash in the shed with the tomato cages from that one ambitious summer long ago.

Pack it all up in whatever box is lying around, and then bring it to Sidetracked, the “curious art salon and art thrift shop with a free studio space called Art for All” at 420 Park Lane in Mankato, open 2-7 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday.

Founded and operated by artist-entrepreneur-force of nature Patti Ruskey, Sidetracked’s Art for All community workspace is exactly where you need to dump out that box, look at each piece of jewelry literally in new light, and start pairing earrings and beads and whatever else with the housewares that need a makeover.

Ask Patti for the tools and materials you need, which will probably have her asking, “What do you need, exactly?”

And you’ll say “Well, I don’t know. I don’t even know where to start,” and pretty soon she’ll be handing you a small plastic tub full of wrapped wire in various lengths and colors and thicknesses, bits of chain, balls of yarn and waxed cord, glue, all these lovely odds and ends from other people’s finished or abandoned art projects.

I have walked both sides of the craft supply acquisition line, and I can tell you with certainty that a decades-old half-roll of cloth-covered wire is infinitely more inspiring and permissiongiving than a newly purchased top-quality full roll of anything.

The project I most recently took to Sidetracked was my greatuncle Bill’s classic Erector Set, which I turned into a bunch of wind chimes and mailed one to each of my sisters and cousins last Christmas.

I like thinking of all five sets chiming in the winds of our different homes in different states, creating a perpetual ethereal harmony that keeps us connected to our long-gone relatives and to each other.

I encourage you to do something similarly reckless, decorative, and joyful with the matriarchal jewelry that’s been entrusted to you. Good luck.

DEAR ANN: Someone just told me the color of the year is beige, a paint color called Blank Canvas. That seems like not even a color. Is this a joke?

DEAR READER: Behr Paint Company was the one to declare “Blank Canvas” its color of the year, "a warm, cozy white paint color just enough pigment to give it some depth and interest, without being quite dark enough to be considered an off-white color.”

It’s worth noting that other “colors of the year” declared by equally notable companies — Valspar, Benjamin-Moore, Sherwin Williams tend toward full-on earth tones and warm sunny hues, while Pantone gave the title to “Viva Magenta,” which Travel+Leisure Magazine describes as “brave and fearless, and a pulsating color whose exuberance promotes a joyous and optimistic celebration... (It) revels in pure joy, encouraging experimentation and self-expression without restraint.”

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Got a question?

Submit it at annrosenquistfee.com (click on Ann’s Fashion Fortunes).

Ann Rosenquist Fee is executive director of the Arts Center of Saint Peter and host of Live from the Arts Center, a music and interview show Thursdays 1-2 p.m. on KMSU 89.7FM.

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