Family tales told in textiles

Molly Cummings of Hopkins met Pat Grady at an art fair in Minnetonka and gave Grady an open-ended assignment: make something from her mother-in-law's wedding gown for her daughter's wedding. Part artist, part environmentalist and part historian, Grady asked about the daughter, her deceased grandmothers, and Cummings herself.

"My mother always wore a string of pearls," Cummings said. Favorite details from the wedding gown of her daughter's paternal grandmother? A long row of silk buttons and silk rosettes on each shoulder. Treasured possession from her daughter's maternal grandmother? A guardian angel pin that she had given Cummings in 1989 and to other daughters and daughters-in-law as well.

Grady, who lives in Minnetonka, went to work with the possessions of three generations -- wedding dress fabric, silk buttons, rosettes, guardian angel pin, pearl necklace and earrings. On the bride's wedding day Saturday, she will walk up the aisle with a small handbag with a pearl handle, an envelope closure with a clasp made from Cummings' favorite earrings and two silk rosettes on each side of the closure. Inside is a guardian angel pin and pictures of each grandmother.

"It's an intensely personal gift," Cummings said -- so personal that when she gave the gift to her daughter Liz at a family bridal shower, she gave each woman a gift-wrapped tuft of Kleenex. "Pat incorporated the spirit of each person in the handbag. She even modeled some of the gathering in my daughter's dress in the handbag design. It's just beautiful," she said.

Grady, 50, started her company, Embellishing Bliss, in 2006 after working as a visual merchandiser for J.C. Penney and Donaldson's and a buyer at Business Incentives promotional products company in Edina. Her embellisher is a machine that looks like a sewing machine, but uses no thread, only needles to punch yarn or fibers into fabric. Grady has used the machine not only to transform old treasures into memory art, but to also make clothing, hats, accent pillows, scarves and softball uniforms.

She wears her own designs, usually in her favorite color combination of plum and lime green. With her short spiked hair and signature chunky vintage jewelry, she rarely needs to start a conversation. Strangers do it for her. Three years ago when her son was in the seventh grade, so many people complimented his mom on what she was wearing that he suggested she start her own line.

Today Grady reformulates old clothes by "embellishing" them with old fabric, or recasts an old jumper with contrasting sleeves from a jacket of a complementary color. Grady finds gorgeous fabric colors and textures in thrift shops and uses them for what she calls personal and livable art, including handbags, belts, jackets, hats, wall art, pillows, table runners, slipcovers and yes, even uniforms for her 9-year-old daughter's softball team. Grady crafted pants from old shirts and embellished each girl's name and team number in an oval on the back of the tops.

Jacqui Barton of Inver Grove Heights contacted Grady when Barton's daughter Kate went to college. A competitive ice skater from age 6 until high school, Kate had a closet full of bright, beaded, shimmering skater's dresses that she didn't know what to do with. Barton asked Grady to make them into a quilt for her daughter's first apartment.

Grady didn't want to do a traditional quilt with fabric squares. "There are no squares in ice skating," she said. Instead, she created a vortex of swirls and curves beside the ruffles from a Miss Piggy tutu punctuating two corners. Barton said that her daughter can't help but laugh every time she sees remnants of the Miss Piggy costume -- the ruffles and even the watch appliqué that's on Miss Piggy's wrist.

"It captured a piece of history," Barton said. "It was our life for years." When Kate saw it, she was overwhelmed. She stroked it and said, "Mom, remember this dress?" Kate had forgotten some of the dresses and asked her mom to remind her when she had worn them.

Grady finds herself in sync with others who have lost a loved one. Before her mom died last year, she made her a jacket with fabric culled from pieces of clothing donated by each of the family's 24 members. Everyone wrote a short note explaining why they chose the item, which Grady compiled in a photo album. A niece donated her soccer socks because she remembered Grady's mom folding socks when she visited.

Gabrielle Royde, who met Grady through Business Incentives, said she's never met anyone quite like her.

Pam Boyd of Eden Prairie lost her dad in 2006. An avid hunter, he left behind old hunting clothes, suspenders, belts, hats and duck callers. Grady made tote bags for Boyd, her mom, her sister and sisters-in-law. One side of the bags was made from his khakis, the other is camouflage. Suspenders became shoulder straps, a Ducks Unlimited logo became a patch and duck callers became charms on the straps.

Boyd has a phrase for the ephemeral gifts that Grady's art conveys. It's about memories, Boyd said, but it's about something else: "heart strength."