BARBRA STREISAND

I was at Warner Bros. delivering something for a movie I was working on.  The costume designer came up to me and in a hushed voice said that Barbra was going to do a secret concert in her backyard in Malibu and wanted something made for her that would be casual, yet sophisticated, like a long skirt and top to match.  Was I interested?    I sure was.

The next week I was summoned to her house.  Not Malibu, but the one in Beverly Hills.  We talked for awhile.  She was lovely.  We/she decided on a long off white cream colored  silk/wool skirt with a ¾ length sleeve and a folded turtle neck with buttons up the back.  The yarn was from a now out of business wholesale supplier, but  similar yarns are now available in local yarn stores.  There were several meetings and fittings. 

Miss Streisand knew exactly what she wanted and I was there to make sure she got it.  It was decided that the outfit  should be beaded and they would be responsible for that so I made the outfit and dropped it off with her "people".  On that delivery I was told that everyone who was working on the project was invited to the dress rehearsal.  Until then I had no idea that anyone else was working on an outfit for her, and much to my surprise I found out that three other outfits were being made. 

She would decide which one to wear at the last minute.  Whichever one felt right at the time.  On the evening of the dress rehearsal my husband and I drove to the designated spot where we were transported by bus, in the dark, to Malibu.  Her backyard was the size of a small park.   There was arena seating facing a big stage.  We were told where to sit and did so. 

Suddenly the music started and the full moon became visible.  There was a cloud of smoke and she entered wearing the outfit I had made!!  It was a thrilling night.  It was her first concert in many years and the outfit was  on the cover of the album, the DVD, the CD and in many magazines. 

She subsequently had me make lots of sweaters for her, but the experience of that concert stands out at the top of all my experiences in my career of Knitter to the Stars. 

That's show business!

 

 

 

 

 

TOM HANKS

This is going to be an important movie, the Costume Designer said, and everything has to be very authentic.  I'd like for you to make some sox for Tom Hanks.  In his role, in the movie, he'd had a problem with his legs when he was a child and there will be a lot of shots of his feet. 

The movie was Forest Gump and it was, indeed, an important movie.  The sox (there were many pairs) were  fair isle  stripes, made of a thin mercerized cotton from Silk City Fibers, a Wholesale only source, and one of those pairs of sox are the ones he's wearing in all the ads for the movie.

 

 

 

I also made, in addition to all the sox,, a pink angora bed jacket that Sally Field wore in her deathbed scene. 

That's show business!

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