Interview with Kate Dickerson

1. Tell us about yourself, Kate. Where is home for you?

Well, I’m kind of at home in three places! I grew up in Minneapolis, and my heart is still there, not to mention lots of friends and family. I now live full-time on Cape Cod, which is also dear to my heart (where we always summered, as a family, when I was growing up - five generations, and counting!) as well as our house in the South of France, where we spend each Spring and Fall. My husband is an artist, too, and we have a gallery of his paintings on Cape Cod. You can’t tell from the street, but our home is behind the gallery, so we have a great commute to work. I paint my canvases in the gallery, right next to Jack's easel. I joke that the UPS man has seen every pair of pajamas I own, since he delivers before the gallery opens. We also have a painting studio in France, in the former stable, which is attached to our house. It’s all made of stone, but has skylights, which give great light.

2. What was your first experience with needlepoint. Who taught you to stitch?

Some friends of ours, on Cape Cod, taught me to needlepoint, one summer when I was in 7th or 8th grade. My first project was a bird I got at the Ben Franklin shop. It was preprinted, and the kit didn’t include enough yarn, but I was undeterred. My mom, my sisters and I were all hooked immediately, and my sisters and I are still needlepointing to this day. There was a darling shop, called The Needle Nest, in Wayzata, MN, where I had my first job - both designing canvases for them, as well as working in the shop. Years later, Barbara Bergsten and I discovered that we had both been working at that shop at the same time! Small world...

3. What lead you to start designing your own canvases? What is your process like?

Having always been into art, since preschool, I naturally began painting my own canvases for our family, in high school. My first big project was painting dining room chair seats for my mom, inspired by Mary Martin’s needlepoint rug, in her book of needlepoint. (My son has those chairs today.) Also, I babysat for a neighbor, who was a great artist, and she inspired me to paint canvases. (Coincidentally, she was the sister of the needlepoint shop owner, and it turns out Barbara B. used to babysit for the sister, so that’s really how we both got into the business.)

My process is that I design by painting right on the canvas. I wasn’t always this way, but after 48 years of painting needlepoint, I’m too impatient, these days, to draw out a design ahead of time! I have a million ideas, and have saved photos for years, in many files, which I refer to for inspiration.

4. Where do you find your inspiration?

I get inspiration from EVERYWHERE. I love interior design and fabrics, anything French or travel-related, good food and wine, fashion, family, friends, holidays… I have always been drawn to the rainbow of colors - especially bright, happy colors. When I was a kid, I had a little art studio in our house, and I collected paint sample cards from the hardware store, when my mom was picking out paint for the house, which I arranged in rainbow order, covering the wall in my studio. (Not my wall, below, but this was my inspiration.)

I’m still drawn to anything in rainbow order, which is how I organize my threads and my paints.

5. Do you have a favorite canvas in your line?

My favorite canvas is always the one I’m designing or have just finished! Frankly, I love them all, and have WAY too many projects going on right now… a common trait amongst us needlepointers! I am in love with my Christmas Tree Advent calendar, which I am about to finish stitching and am looking forward to having it made up as a workable calendar. (I just got magnets in the mail, for the finisher to use.) I’m also currently working on a few gifts for next Christmas and Hanukkah - a weed leaf belt for one son and a dreidel for my other son and his wife, amongst them.

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Interview with Kate Dickerson