Maira Kalman Is Opening a Store Upstate
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If you’ve ever wondered what a store run by the artistMaira Kalmanwould look like, here’s your chance to find out. Kalman will be opening a pop-up at the Shaker Museum in Chatham in conjunction with an exhibition she’s curating there featuring selections from the collection alongside new paintings. Called “Shaker Outpost: Design, Commerce, and Culture,” the show opens on May 2 and runs through July 5. The shop, which opens on the same day as the show, will run through Christmas and carry a Kalman-curated mix of old and new things.
“It’s really meant to be a general store that has things that are both practical and poetic, not too expensive, not too precious, somewhere between an artist installation of what a store might be in a dream and actual things to buy,” she says. Some things you might find there: antique books from France, a bowler hat from the 1800s, bluebird-embroidered nightgowns, Original Crown Mill stationery in blue, watches from M&Co. (the design company she started with her late husband, Tibor Kalman), 19th-century dog figurines, and marmalades by Chris Crawford ofTart Vinegar.
“There’s going to be an eclectic collection that will keep changing with whimsy and curated with great love. Everything has a reason for being there. There’ll be a changing landscape of niceness,” says Kalman. There’s also a personal element to the wares on display: “Some of it is consignment from friends who make things. I have a friend, Lydie Raschka, who’s making dishcloths that I adore. My sister makes these beautiful felted pillows and hats. And some of the trays my son, Alex, and I make in the studio, plus toys on wheels he’s making.”
Kalman herself hopes to be there when the store is open. “I plan to sit outside and just talk to people and chew the fat, as we say in the Old Country. Maybe there’ll be some cookies and lemonade,” she says. Shoppers might even be able to strike a deal: “I’m looking at a tumbleweed from Texas that’s going to be on the table there. I don’t think that’s going to be for sale unless somebody must have it.”
Some things you’ll find at the shop
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The store will be brick-and-mortar only, but here’s an example of something you can find there. “I’ll have stationery because it’s essential that people write letters to each other,” says Kalman. “I write illustrated letters to my granddaughters every week. I’ve been doing that for ten years, so they have an incredible cache. I write on Crown Mill blue stationery, so that’s what I have in the shop.”
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These pink high-bounce balls, a favorite of Kalman’s, will also be available.
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