AN INDEPENDENT HISTORY PROJECT PEOPLE · CLOTHES · DOCUMENTS
Western Wear
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Needle & thread

Look for the hands as well as the name

A shop label gives us one point of entry. The workshop accounts also name embroiderers, tailors, finishers and business partners. Reading the photographs beside those accounts helps restore individual contributions to the story, while keeping an uncredited garment’s authorship open.

Viola Grae

Hank Thompson’s “Humpty Dumpty Heart” boots, 1964, as presented by the Country Music Hall of Fame; the museum credits the embroidered scene to Viola Grae.

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Sam Formann

Close view of the cream yoke, rose embroidery, double piping and arrow-tipped pocket of the Sam A. Formann Co. shirt.

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