My studio is in the 1960s add-on den in the back of our our 1926 house. I live here with my husband and two dogs. Right outside the studio door there’s a covered carport I work under when it’s nice out. We also park our cars there so for 14 years every time I walk into my home, I walk into my studio.
I have a few brown paper accordion file folders that live inside a studio cabinet. They’re catchalls for the detritus that can’t find a home anywhere else – random drawings, crap I find on the street, the miscellaneous photograph, a wallpaper sample, magazine tear sheets, physical remnants to be flipped through and added to. In 2010 I started a studio blog and named it after this perfect pouch. Writing about how and why I do what I do in my studio doesn’t come easily, which is why I wanted a place where I could piece together ideas and trains of thought.
I learned a lot about my process on the original Accordion File. Only a few people read it, mostly friends, so it felt like something between a studio visit and correspondence. Pulling back the curtain to my studio in a more long form intimate way eventually petered out as the cocktail party of social media won my attention.
It’s fun, the scroll, sure, but I can’t focus enough to actually write there. So here, on this brand new version of my website, I’m resurrecting Accordion File. Check out the first one here.