By Quinn Riley
Actress, textile designer, world traveler, antique collector, producer—Clare Louise Frost lives a spirited and energetic life. “I feel very lucky that I get to do the work I love,” says Clare, as she chats from TAMAM, the East Village shop that she co-founded with textile designer Elizabeth Hewitt of Tulu Textiles and antiques dealer Huseyin Kaplan of Karavan. As we talk, Clare is surrounded by an arrangement of alluring goods from her travels throughout India, Morocco, Afghanistan, and Turkey. From Vintage Uzbek bowls to Indian Lehenga skirts to an array of hand-embroidered textiles, each shop item in TAMAM tells its own story. Patterns from Clare Louise Frost’s textiles line, one of our to-the-trade showroom lines, can be found throughout her shop, covering pillows, adorning slippers, and printed on highly-coveted silk scarfs and sarongs.
Above // Clare Louise Frost by David Lawrence Byrd
Clare grew up in a family that traveled frequently, as her father was a civil servant with the state department. After graduating from Brown University with a degree in Architectural Studies and Hispanic Literature, she traveled to Italy and studied vineyard work and winemaking in Tuscany. Soon after, she landed in Istanbul for 9 years, where she worked in antique textiles and acted in film and TV commercials.
At Brown, Clare explored a wide array of courses, including historical costume and textile production: “traditional clothing is made cleverly. It’s not mass-produced, it is really made properly and efficiently.” Sustainable sources and ethical labor are important to Clare and her production process reflects these values. All of Clare’s blocks are hand-carved by female artisans in India and then printed using traditional methods. She pairs these processes nicely with an incorporation of modern design aesthetics. “Traditional technique doesn’t mean that you have to use traditional pattern.” Clare’s throws are handwoven in Turkey, her striped textiles are made in Kabul, Afghanistan, and many of her embroidery threads come from Pakistan.
Clare’s love for animals is a strong focal point in many of her patterns. “I’ve always loved animal imagery and I think it’s very universal. You find it everywhere in the world… a lot of it is related to magic or love or ferocity or power. I think it’s just one of those constants.” Clare’s ‘Emerald Leopards’ pattern depicts an exquisite hand-embroidered leopard with a curled tail. Popular across many cultures, the leopard imagery is a common Afghan motif, a symbol of healing in pre-olympian greek mythology, and a general figure of bravery and courage.
‘Lovebirds,’ another hand-embroidered design, reminds Clare of her grandmother—”she loved birds. I always think of her when I see them.” Clare also embroidered Lovebirds on a pair of shoes, hand-made by a cobbler in Istanbul and hand-embroidered in Afghanistan. These shoes are available for purchase in her shop, TAMAM.
Clare’s father, a lover of the water, inspired her pattern ‘Kinship.’ “His doodle has always been sailboats,” Clare explains, as she describes her father’s deep passion for sailing, a hobby that he started as a young child. For ‘Kinship,’ Clare had her father sketch sailboats, all with sloops in various positions. She turned these sketches into beautiful watercolor drawings and then transformed those into blocks. The resulting pattern is a beautiful ode to the deep blues of a water landscape.
Many of Clare’s designs commemorate her infatuation with rich, authentic color. Admiring color is one of her greatest past-times. When she worked in a restaurant on the river, she would scribble notes as simple visual reminders. A note would read “teal, dark teal, tugboat” and these words would become a color scheme for a future textile design. Clare’s series of Kimonos, called “The Vivids,” celebrate color in its deepest form. All handmade in silk crepe and hand-stitched, “they are just pure color…there’s a bright emerald one, a rich orange one, and a deep electric royal blue.” Below is Clare modeling her ‘Vivid Orange’ and ‘Vivid Royal Blue’ colorways.
Conversations surrounding color and its form are familiar topics of inquiry for Clare, as she taught art courses for an NGO in Kabul, Afghanistan years ago. How is color culturally constructed, and how do you teach color? While each culture has its own unique set of color combinations that are considered aesthetically pleasing, Clare has discovered a number of more universal colors and their meanings. Blues, the color of the ocean and the sky, symbolize peace, stability, and serenity. Turquoise is considered a lucky color in many cultures, symbolizing good fortune and emotional balance. Continuing this dialogue with color, Clare’s most recent fabric series plays with solid hue and stripes. Below are two of her new colorways, ‘Maryam’ and ‘Yalda,’ named after the women that loom these handwoven silk and cotton satin fabrics. Clare views stripes as the “purity of color” and the contrast that she explores in Yalda emphasizes the power of opposites.
Another two bespoke textiles, ‘Capsi’ and ‘Lucky,’ were inspired by two of Clare’s beloved dogs. She turned a photograph of her dog, Capsi, into a drawing that was then transformed into an intricate hand-carved block. ‘Capsi’ comes in a striking blue and green colorway. Clare’s ‘Lucky’ pattern is a sweet memory of the heart chain that her dog wore. The golds and reds are playful and warm. Clare has also printed ‘Lucky’ on an oversized silk scarf, a pocket square, and a kimono, all available at TAMAM.
In addition to her career in textile design, Clare holds a deep love for the arts. She has her own production company, SK Deli Market Productions, founded with her dear friend, Micah Stathis. At the moment, the pair is actually working on an independent film about textiles, entitled “The Sisters Karras.” Clare produced, production-designed, and acted in one of the lead roles as Helen. Filmed in her shop, TAMAM, the production tells the story of a woman that inherits a precious textile from her father, only to find that the fabric was cut in half in the will between a half-sister that she has never met. This “labor of love,” as Clare calls it, has a small and incredibly passionate and dedicated team. To support small-scale production companies and the greater arts community, the crew is selling several of the Turkish Yastik Rugs that were used in the film as props. They are currently seeking producer-investors while the film is being edited and a film festival strategy is formed.
The passion and love that Clare puts into her work is truly immaculate. To explore her production process in greater detail, and to get an inside look at some of Clare’s personal interior spaces, follow the image galleries below. To request Clare Louise Frost memos for your next project, reach out to our showroom or schedule a virtual line presentation. We’d love to show all of them to you!
CLARE LOUISE FROST PRODUCTION // INDIA
CLARE LOUISE FROST PRODUCTION // AFGHANISTAN
CLARE LOUISE FROST’S APARTMENT IN BROOKLYN, NY
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