Amy Bartel’s passion for creating beautiful and unique things began at an early age. While growing up in the small town of Norwich, OH, she was mentored by a bevy of designing women—her grandmother, mother and aunts—who she often joined at craft fairs where they sold their hand-stitched, -crocheted and -knitted wares.
For as long as she could remember, her mother sewed clothes for her and her dolls. And before long she taught young Amy how to sew, and knit too.
Years of exposure to the creative process and working with a variety of colorful textiles sparked Bartel’s artistic side and led her to pursue an art degree at the College of Wooster in Ohio.
She earned an undergraduate degree in art at the liberal arts college, but upon graduation wasn’t sure how she could apply it in the working world.
She eventually chose education as a field of study, while satisfying her artistic side by taking advantage of painting classes and Plein Air opportunities in the Chicago area where she and husband, Lawrence, were living.
But sewing continued to be a functional outlet for her creativity. When Lawrence assumed pastorship of Niccolls Memorial Church in Old Forge, she made her own clothes, banners for the church, and decor for their home.
Soon to follow was the birth of son, Jens, and later, daughter, Lydia. In a continuation of the sewing tradition, Amy made clothes for Lydia too.
Her creations began to catch the attention of some of the Niccolls’ congregation who would often ask, “Did you make your outfit?”
The encouragement got her thinking.
“Up until then I had always thought of art as a hobby, not as a career,” she said.
But what would her next step be?
The answer came while on a four-month sabbatical to Europe with her family in 2012.
She embarked on the journey uncertain of what she was “going to work on” within herself, but once in the presence of the historic architecture, vibrant gardens and brilliantly colored textiles, she had the realization that she wanted to take her artistry to a level beyond “hobby” and pursue her passion for design.
With that determination, she recognized there was one missing piece to her pursuit: she needed to learn how to make her own patterns.
So in the fall of 2013, with both her children in school, she enrolled in a Fashion Design class at Syracuse University. She attended classes two days a week throughout the fall and did independent study through the spring ‘14 semester.
Her final project was to create an eight-piece collection that included one finished piece and seven sketches. The collection combined the elements of her design aesthetic that she describes as dressy/casual/playful.
She loves to combine vintage fabrics with contemporary fabrics and is inspired by textiles used in Victorian England and eastern Indian culture.
“Generally the fabric choice comes before the design. A fabric jumps out at me, then I determine how it can be used,” she said.
Amy makes mostly skirts and dresses, using a lot of quilting cottons due to their saturation of color and variety of prints.
She generally finds fabric at quilt stores, but also has traveled to New York City to shop at such stores as Mood, the flagship of fabric outlets featured on the cable reality show, Project Runway.
Once school wrapped in May, she showed some of her work to Kate Russell, owner of Mountain Greenery on Main Street, Old Forge, who agreed to sell her custom-designed pocketed skirts at the shop.
One of the designs, a wraparound skirt, was modeled at Niccolls’ Fashions by the Lake fashion show on Wednesday, July 23rd.
She is currently looking into opening an online shop on Etsy, known as the world’s most vibrant handmade marketplace, under the name of Forget-Me-Not Designs.
It was a sabbatical that allowed Amy to open her mind, to find a way to move forward and realize what the missing link was that was keeping her from fulfilling her dream.
“My advice to anyone pursuing their dream of an art career is to remove the distraction that’s keeping you from your pursuit. Gain as much knowledge as you can to figure out how you can make a living out of what you love to do,” she said.