High Point Market Month!

It’s surprising how quickly High Point Market month comes around, and though it feels like it has quickly boomeranged since we saw everyone in October, we’re ready with an array of new products and a roster of events about which we are very excited. We’ll be featuring the separate happenings in detail during the next two weeks, and then on April 18th, we’ll have an events recap so you can find all of the dates/times in one post.

High Point Market Month!

Each of today’s highlights kicks off or takes place on the opening day of market, Friday, April 21st. At 3 p.m., Brownlee will have an encore of his very popular Bonsai tour; and at 5 p.m., we’ll be hosting an Anti-Defamation League event you won’t want to miss—see details for both of these at the bottom of the post. The other happening we want to highlight can be enjoyed from the moment market opens on April 21st until it closes on Wednesday, April 26th. Along with debuting an array of exciting new products by Marjorie Skouras, we are featuring a selection of vintage dresses she has collected.

Marjorie Skouras in one of her bright and beautiful dresses, 24 of which we will be showcasing this market.

The exhibition is called La Vida es Bella: Mexican Modernist Textiles from The Marjorie Skouras Collection. Marjorie has collected over 200 textiles and we will be featuring 24 vintage Mexican dresses from the 1970s that she has handpicked for us. Marjorie’s interest in these fashion statements began when she bought a ruined 19th-century colonial mansion in Merida, Mexico, in 2015. While the collection began simply as a passion for the pieces themselves, Marjorie became so enthralled, she began researching the dress makers/designers in order to understand their inspirations.

Two of the vintage Mexican dresses in the Marjorie Skouras Collection, 24 of which we will debut during High Point Market Month.

Marjorie found that the impetus for many of the designs sprang from Mexican art and culture during the 1960s and 1970s, and that they reflected the surrealist, modern, and pop art movements that were exploding during those decades. “My fascination for these dresses can actually be traced back to 1974 when we lived in Los Angeles,” she notes. “It was de rigueur at that time for those attending the eighth grade at the Westridge School for Girls to wear embroidered wedding dresses from Oaxaca with Sperry Topsiders; that is, if you were a cool girl!” And we all know that Marjorie was/is definitely a cool girl! “Fast forward to 2015, and as the owner of a ruined 19th-century colonial mansion in Merida, Yucatan, which was my life’s dream (or so I thought…), I decided that I should have a wardrobe to complement my new lifestyle,” she adds.

The exhibition of Marjorie Skouras’ collection of vintage Mexican dresses at the Museo del Arte Popular de Yucatan in Merida.

caption + alt: The exhibition of Marjorie Skouras’ collection of vintage Mexican dresses at the Museo del Arte Popular de Yucatan in Merida.

This desire inspired Marjorie to begin looking for the vintage Mexican dresses and her excitement grew as she began finding exquisite specimens. “After buying about 15 of them, I realized there was an element to which I was drawn in the pieces by several designers—this is where the surrealist, modern, and pop art movements come into play because their patterns reflected these dynamic developments made by the artists involved in those movements,” she remembers. “Once I realized this, I narrowed my search in order to concentrate on the dresses with the certain motifs that brought them that particular style.”

Something else organic happened as she continued to find specimens. “As I continued to research the makers, Mexican culture, and the art that was burgeoning during the 1960s and 1970s, the focus of the collection was created,” she says. “I never imagined that it would be of interest to museums, but 50 of the dresses I own have been tapped by the Museo del Arte Popular de Yucatan in Merida to be shown there, and will then travel to Mexico City and other places around the world.”

The invitation for the exhibition of Marjorie Skouras’ collection of vintage Mexican dresses at the Museo del Arte Popular de Yucatan in Merida.

The title of the exhibition is “Transpositions: Popular Art Reinterpreted, Mexican Fashions of the 1960s and 1970s,” and it is Marjorie’s hope that it will capture the attention of book publishers. “Serendipity, or more likely another manifestation of the magical surrealism of everyday life in Mexico, is at work here,” she adds. “There are many designs in several mediums percolating, which will be based on elements from the collection.”

Other Friday Events

As we mentioned up top, another event that take place on Friday, April 21st, is Bonsai With Brownlee Currey Part 2 at 3 p.m. With the success of our bonsai tour last October, he will continue to share and explore the ancient techniques of bonsai with a tour of our collection of live bonsai trees that are always displayed in the Currey showroom during market. There’s definitely more to learn from our resident bonsai master so be sure and stop by.

And at 5 p.m., please join us as Michel Smith Boyd, Irwin Novack, and Rachel Stewart are honored by the National Home Furnishings Industry’s chapter of the Anti-Defamation League for their efforts to bring awareness to the mission of the ADL. This dynamic trio will be the organization’s 2023 honorees. You’ll also learn more about the ADL and how you can participate in creating a more inclusive society for all. You can attend all of our events in our showroom in the IHFC at M110 on Main Street. If you haven’t registered for High Point yet, you can do so by clicking through. We’ll see you all soon!