A Neighborhood Business—Getting to Know Our Neighbor
100 Acts of Sewing, 131 Corbett Avenue
Open House August 24th, 10AM—3PM
You
probably noticed a change at the corner of Corbett and Hattie a few years ago. The awning of Corbett Cleaners came down and little while later a sign went up. Sonya Philip is the owner and designer of the pattern company, 100 Acts of Sewing. She has strong ties to the Castro, growing up in the neighborhood in the 1980s and returning to live with her family on Eureka Street in the early 2000s.
Sonya started the project in 2012 with the desire to simplify her
wardrobe and a goal of making one hundred dresses in a year. After completing each dress, its photo was uploaded to the project's website. The intention wasn't to make them simply for sale, knowing that a conversation needed to be started highlighting the distinction between handmade and manufactured in order to create an appreciation for the difference. Now, twelve years later,
100 Acts of Sewing patterns are sold online and in stores both nationally and
internationally.
As an avid teacher, Sonya has taught workshops across the country, encouraging others think about clothing and how sewing their own is easier than they think. She signed a lease for the space at 131 Corbett in February of 2020 with the intention of creating both a workspace and a place for classes. When lockdown happened, those plans were unfortunately put on hold.
Sonya Philip has always made things. It’s the way things were done in her family.
Her father, an architect from Australia, spent weekends laying brick in the backyard or remodeling the house. Her mother, an interior designer from the Philippines, designed and sewed her own wedding dress. Both parents encouraged her to truly look at things and instilled a love for the handcrafted.
Sonya studied drawing and printmaking in high school with every intention of going to art school. Life intervened, as did other areas of fascination, eventually leading to an MFA in Creative
Writing from Mills College. As a self-taught artist, she enjoys the freedom of exploring and stretching mediums. Preferring to work in project series, Sonya practices what she calls ‘conceptual craft.’ Sonya lives in San Francisco with her husband and three children.
Neighbors are welcome to drop by the Open House on Saturday, August 24th from 10:00am-3:00pm to learn more about Sonya and maybe start sewing.
Need a pattern from 100 Acts of Sewing? Go to Patterns. Want
to learn how to sew something? Look at Tutorials. Have a question for Sonya, fill out this form to Contact. Or buy the Book. Watch for Classes to be scheduled soon.
131 Corbett, 1988. Credit: John Koelsch
Life on Corbett Heights in 1961
Ruth Asawa Lived at 21 Saturn Street
Ruth Asawa (1926-2013), a modernist artist known primarily for her abstract looped-wire sculptures inspired by natural and organic forms, lived with her husband, Albert Lanier at 21 Saturn Street from the 1950s to1962.
Many museums and institutions have her work in their collections, including the Amon Carter, Asheville Art, Black Mountain, Cantor Arts Center, Crystal Bridges, SF Fine Arts, Getty, Guggenheim, LA Contemporary Art, MOMA, SFMOMA, National Portrait Gallery, Norton
Simon, and Whitney museums and more…
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art has in its collections, work by Ruth Asawa from the 1950s when she resided on Saturn Street:
In the summer of 1947, between terms as a student at North Carolina’s Black Mountain College, Asawa traveled to Toluca, Mexico, on a service trip. In the local markets, she discovered craftspeople making wire baskets. The experience inspired her technique of looping wire around wooden
dowels…. Asawa made Untitled (S.14), among the most evocative and ambitious of her hanging wire sculptures, in her studio on Saturn Street in San Francisco (SFMOMA Website).
Ruth was born in rural California and was sent to Japanese internments camps in Santa Anita, California, and later, Arkansas. She
studied art at Black Mountain College in North Carolina, met her husband and married in 1949. Her work was first exhibited in the 1950s when she lived within CHN’s boundaries. She bought her house at 1116 Castro in 1962 after leaving Saturn Street. In 2006, the de Young Museum was gifted fifteen wire sculptures for installation in the lobby of the Nancy B. and Jake L. Hamon Tower.
Ruth described our neighborhood as having “all the qualities of North Beach but none
of the involvement” (San Francisco Examiner, February 12, 1961).
If you would like to see more Ruth Asawa’s work and a photograph of her and her children by Imogen Cunningham on Saturn Street, see the David Zwirner art gallery.
Ruth Asawa, de Young Museum
The same issue of the Examiner in 1961 also describes our neighborhood.
“…the poor man’s Telegraph Hill.”
Unknown real estate
agent(San Francisco Examiner, February 12, 1961)
* * * *
Newcomers to the area “are comprised of anyone who can afford $175 a month…They are sports car people…air hostesses, secretaries, and bachelors—mostly young single people…Some of the old people are still here…It was like living in the country.”
Grace Perrego (San Francisco Examiner, February 12,
1961)
Another Well-Known Artist in Our ‘Hood
Ruth Bernhard (1905-1906) was hailed by Ansel Adams as “the greatest photographer of the nude.” Ruth Bernard was born in Germany. Her father, Lucian Bernhard, was a well-known graphic designer, illustrator, and type designer. Ruth took up photography when she received a gift of a camera from her father. She immigrated to the United States in 1929 and in 1935 she met Edward
Weston, who became a close friend and mentor. In the 1940s, she became part of Group f/64, joining Modernist West Coast photographers like Weston, Ansel Adams, Minor White, Imogen Cunningham, Wynn Bullock and Dorothea Lange. Her work is included in the collections of major museums worldwide. While she never lived in our neighborhood (Clay Street in Pacific Heights), she was a frequent visitor to her friend and fellow photographer, Lorin Gillette, owner of 189-191 Corbett.
Here she is at a Christmas party for neighbors at 191A Corbett in the late 1970s, a party hosted by Lorin. Lorin is the fellow in the photo on the left, in front, on his knees, holding the cable release.
Can you find her? Let us know if you do. You get extra points if you can find Air Force Colonel Price Rice, her lover at the time (Ruth was bisexual). Ok, here’s a hint. He was a Tuskegee Airman fighter pilot. There are two other guests that you might recognize as well, still living in the neighborhood, although a bit older.
September 5—Mayoral Debate, Randall Museum, 6:30 PM
September 30—CHN General Membership Meeting, 501 Castro, 7 PM
Board of Directors Election
The CHN Board of Directors election is coming in September. Any member of CHN who has been a paid member for at least 90 days may nominate him/her self or any
other member to become a board member by informing the secretary ([email protected]) a minimum of 30 days prior to the annual member meeting. This year that membership meeting is September 30, 2024.
