summer of love – The Humble Fabulist

2017 marked the 50th anniversary of the legendary San Francisco Summer of 1967 and the city celebrated it with a number of events, among which The Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion, and Rock & Roll at the de Young Museum. We passed up the exhibition because it ran along the same lines as the Counter-Couture: Handmade Fashion in an American Counterculture, on show at MAD in New York City, only a few months earlier.

But we could not, nor did we ever want to, let this slightly bonkers je ne sais quoi, San Francisco’s very own particular character formed throughout its fifty-year long trip from bohemia to hipsteria, from liberation to gentrification, go unnoticed. Love was (still) in the air this Summer of 2017 and we were ready to embrace it. Because, as another American legend rightly said:

”Ultimately you can listen to only one thing, not your president, not your many misguided leaders, save a few… You must listen to your own heart and do what it dictates. Because your heart is the only thing which can tell you what is right and what is wrong.” – Joan Baez, 1965

Mid-March was icy-cold here in New York; the City was covered in snow. But spring was around the corner and summer a hop, skip and a jump away. And not just any summer – this year marked the 50th anniversary of the legendary San Francisco Summer of Love, in 1967. There would be a ton of events to celebrate it on West Coast later on but, here we were, in New York City, in full winter attire, off to see ”Counter-Couture: Handmade Fashion in an American Counterculture”, an exhibition of handmade dresses and accessories made by those free-spirited crafts-men and women who, in their rejection of the establishment of conformism, materialism and consumerism, went on to create some of the most original, superbly crafted designs, examples of which you are about to see below. They were the Hippies, the Flower Children, those young, idealists who struggled for equality and peace but got lost in their quest to reach those higher – LSD infused – levels of consciousness. They were men and women of my generation and they helped shaped me – and others like me – into the characters we have become today. Imagine how the world would have been, had they not got lost on their way.

Images from the exhibition

Michael Fajans
Hand-embroidered and appliqué Army Coat, 1967

Janet Lipkin
”Paisley”: Coat for Sylvia Bennett, c. 1970

Barbara Ramsey’s coat and jeans exemplify the Counterculture’s resourcefulness and need for self-expression. Each small patch bears a story or memory of its own and forms a scrapbook of life experiences – worn by the person who lived them.

In 1971 Ramsey was given a ragged, wool-lined coat that she patched with fabric. As time passed, she sewed layers of patches made from other worn-out clothes onto the coat. Ramsey applied a similar process to a pair of jeans and eventually completed the outfit.

Barbara Ramsey
Medical School Outfit, 1971-75

100% Birgitta (Birgitta Bjerke)’s crocheted coats for Roger Daltrey of The Who and his then wife Heather recall the psychedelic visual culture of the 1960s rock-and-roll scene. Displayed flat on the wall, the garments – constructed in fan shapes – vibrate with kaleidoscopic colours that suggest blossoming flowers, Tibetan mandalas, and patterns inspired by Indian textile traditions.

Dancepiece by Leslie Correll, 1971
Hammered brass, Turkish beads, African (Venetian) trade beads mounted on old Indonesia batik fabric

Kaisik Wong’s evening ensembles (above) and Yellow and Green Ray dress and headdress (below) from the ”Seven Ray” series, 1974.

Mama Cass Elliot Dress (below left) c. 1967.
Cass Elliot was a member of The Mamas & the Papas. The panne velvet dress she wore, with its gentle ombré gradient colour, brings to light the dreamy character of her stage presence. Celebrated as a sex symbol and role model for young women of her generation, Elliot donned theatrical styles that showcased her dynamic personality and held the attention of her audiences and fans. The appliqué sunburst on the front of the bodice depicts Virgo, Elliot’s astrological sign, while reflecting the Counterculture’s interest in self-exploration through the study of cosmology.

SAS Colby – Ruffle My Feathers, 1972

Fayette Hauser, Cosmic Gypsy Ensemble, 1970

Gretchen Fetchen (Paula Douglas). Acid Test Dress and Boots, 1965.

Gretchen Fetchen was one of the early participants in the San Francisco Acid Test happenings organized by Ken Kesey’s Merry Pranksters in the mid-1960s. The events were designed as gatherings to promote consciousness expansion and creativity through the use of LSD which was then legal.