I was born and raised on a farm south of Kalamazoo Michigan. I was the youngest of a family of three boys. Some of my earliest memories are of collecting textile scraps. My mother made most of our clothing and used the scraps to make quilts. I would collect the little pieces that were leftover from the quilts and save them.

After high school, I started college without much of a picture of what I would study or what I wanted to be. As a farm boy without much exposure to the outside world, becoming a weaver or textile designer was not something I saw for myself. In college I jumped around a lot from one major to another, taking a few art classes. I finished college with a bachelor’s degree in Interior Design. Looking at graduate schools, I knew my interest in textiles could take me in several directions: art school, technical school with a focus on textile production, or history in preparation for museum work. I settled on textile design and was lucky enough to be accepted into the Master of Fine Arts program at Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan.

After receiving my MFA, I moved to New York City. I got my first job working in the design studio of Jack Lenore Larsen. It was a great experience to work for Jack and be part of such a creative design team. During my four years in New York I worked for several interior textile companies including Knoll International, Cheney Brothers, and Isabel Scott Fabrics.

I moved to Maine in 1972 to work as an independent weaver and farmer. In 1975, I took a position as assistant professor at the University of Maine, where I taught design classes for ten years. During this time, I also collaborated with seven other weavers to start North Country Textile. For the next 27 years, North Country Textile produced lines of handover textile items that were sold to retail stores across the United States.

In the mid to late 80’s as HIV continued to affect people around me, I became involved as a volunteer working in HIV and helped establish a local AIDS service organization, Down East AIDS Network (DEAN), serving people in coastal eastern Maine. In 1991 I started working for DEAN as a case manager and HIV educator. From 1995-2000, I served as director of DEAN. Presently I work as the HIV Program Coordinator for Regional Medical Center at Lubec, managing federal and state HIV programs for the five northern counties of Maine (60% of the state).

My interest in gourds started in the mid 90’s when I saw some beautiful gourds at a craft fair by a local artist. Over the next couple of years I collected several gourds. In 2000, I raised my first gourds on my farm. After growing them and watching them go through the drying process, I was ready to start working with the dyed gourds myself. I first experimented with gluing feathers to the gourds. I then moved on to sewing fresh water pearls onto the gourds. I have continued to work with gourds over the past 6 years experimenting with porcupine quills, brass wire, semi-precious stones, and gold leaf. I continue to find the patina of the natural gourd very beautiful. As the gourds go through the drying process, they become covered with a mold, which, when washed off, leaves a natural design embedded in the surface of the gourds. Many historians believe gourds were the first wild plants domesticated by humans.

I hope you enjoy looking at my embellished gourd vessels, as I would enjoy hearing from you with any comments.

Click Here for My Resume.