My mother, a very craft-oriented person, is from Guatemala and my father was an architect with family ties to both Guatemala and Morocco. They had a whirlwind love affair which ended before I was born. When I was a teenager, I drew a picture of my dream home only to find out later that it was an exact duplicate of what Moroccans call a riad. Even now, when I try to rationalize why it is that I truly love/obsess over what I do for a living, I have to come to the conclusion that it runs through my veins; that some traits and interests are just hereditary.
While I was born in Miami Beach, my mom and I moved to Guatemala for a few years when I was young. I still remember the colors of the fabrics and houses vividly…and climbing mountains and finding women working on different looms and coming upon houses with beautiful pots filled with water and fragrant flower petals. During Christmas, there would be parades down the streets at night with lively music and the most beautiful colored paper lanterns you can imagine. Even now, after returning and living in the US for most of my life, my lasting impression of Guatemala is color – vibrant and lush and so visually exciting. Here is a little of what I’m talking about:
I love that next-to-last pic of the little girl — she looks almost like an old black & white photo of my Mom when she was younger. One of my dreams is to book some time with her and go on a surprise trip back to Guatemala. I’d love to see her excitement at finding out our destination and exploring one of my home countries as an adult as well. Wonder what new inspirations are awaiting?
[...] Speaking of color, I recently received my Color Association newsletter. They are one of a few companies that forecast, research and archive color. They also provide color trend information to various industries 14 months in advance. Every year, theirs is one of the reports I look to for guidance in the colors to keep in mind while creating new sample boards.  Their site is pretty interesting — take a gander, if you’d like. Their newsletter advised of an informative article written by their former director, Margaret Walch. She recently took a trip to Chile and wrote about its architecture, use of color and also threw in a bit of history. It’s a nice read.  (I love learning about the use of color in other countries. I wrote a bit about mine in The Colors of Guatemala.) [...]
[...] for me? Has to be The Colors of Guatemala — back in February 2008. One thing I would change about that post is the crediting of the [...]
Book that time with your Mum, do it. Love this post and I want to dive right into those skiens of thread in the last photo.
Thank you for featuring my blog.