By: Joan Beswick
The Oxford
English Dictionary defines an apron as ‘a protective garment covering the front
of one’s clothes’. This is a utilitarian but very limited description of a
functional but funky garment – one which Diane Shink sees as both a chronicle
of the varied roles of women in society and an echo of “changes in fashion,
fabric and popular colours”.
Diane’s collection
of almost nine hundred aprons began as a way to find donor fabric for her real
passion, quilting. Thankfully, her ‘apron
hobby’ took on a life of its own and evolved over time into this wonderful collection.
Reactions to her exhibit ranged from a middle-aged woman’s nostalgia for the
aprons worn long ago by her grandmother to the delighted smile of a high school
student who deemed it ‘just awesome’. Visitors to the library stood under the
Graphic Novels sign or beside the circle of computers with users busily perusing
Facebook and Twitter –they gazed upward, some smiling, others reflecting, some
whispering comments to friends - all
enjoying in different ways this vintage assembly.
Diane's exhibit has moved on but all is not lost – for ‘everything old is new again’ – and aprons are making a comeback. A recent article about Diane’s collection, written by Susan Schwartz last February in the National Post, notes that McCall’s now has at least fifteen apron patterns, there is now an apron website called “Tie One On”, and an apron magazine called “Apronology” with the mission of crafting ‘aprons with attitude’.
Diane’s recent
book, “Aprons – My Grandmother Always Wore One”, is an agenda that includes pictures of some of her aprons with descriptive commentary. Copies were available at both the library
and at festival headquarters (and according to Schwartz’s article in the
National Post, this book/agenda can also be purchased directly from Diane at
514-605-7845 or by contacting her at dimacquilt@sympatico.ca).
Inspired by Diane Shink's apron exhibit, we started 2013 with fresh aprons and new agendas, pleased that everything old is indeed 'new again'. Thanks, Diane!
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