FRIDAY, JULY- 26
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Designing Woman
This Oak Park resident has the magic touch for
everything from mezuzah covers to tables.
ELIZABETH APPLEBAUM ASSOCIATE EDITOR
PHOTO BY DANIEL LIPPITT
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Orchard Lake Rd. • S. of Maple • W. Blmfd.
Purveyors of Haworth country furniture, handcrafted traditional
English kitchens and the legendary CAGLO cooker.
1050 Webster Birmingham, Michigan 48009 (810) 540-0450
Jackie Conrad with her mezuzah covers: A relaxing art.
ackie Conrad is the kind of
woman who gets right to
the point.
The needlepoint, that is.
Her Oak Park home is filled
with her needlepoint creations,
from a nostalgic scene on De-
lancey Street in New York to the
profile of a fashionable, con-
temporary woman.
She doesn't part with much
of it — "you put so much time
into these. No amount of mon-
ey you get could replace that" —
but she has established a name
for herself creating needlepoint
mezuzah covers which sell at
both Borenstein's in Oak Park
and Esther's Judaica in West
Bloomfield.
It wasn't exactly love at first
sight, however, between Mrs.
Conrad and the needle.
"My mother, Fran Sokol, was
always doing needlepoint when
I was a kid," she recalls. "When
I was 15, I started something,
too. I started but never finished
it. My mom did that for me."
As an adult, Mrs. Conrad de-
cided to give it another try. She
began with something nice and
soft and easy, a teddy bear. She
tried it, and this time she liked
it.
The way some singles hang
out at bars, or Elvis fans linger
long past closing hour outside
the gates of Graceland, Mrs.
Conrad made Rachel's Needle-
point in Southfield her home
away from home. There, she re-
ceived plenty of free advice and
bought more than a handful of
graphs and canvases and
thread, none of which is espe-
cially inexpensive. A typical can-
vas can cost between $35 and
$100; each packet of thread runs
several dollars.
Needlepoint involves a great
deal of technical know-how, in
addition to the creative skills.
After weeks or months or years
of work, when the piece is actu-
ally complete, it will have to be
"blocked" — wetting and tight-
ening the canvas — before it is
framed.
Blocking can cost another $35
if done professionally, and cus-
tom frames can be very expen-
sive. Mrs. Conrad does her own,
which for starters means no
glass, "or else the needlepoint
will rot."
Mrs. Conrad's specialty is
mezuzah covers, which she can
complete in one or two nights.
Her other works are more de-
manding.
"You'll do it and do it and do
it, then put it down for a year,
then finally return to it," she
said. "It takes a lot of time, but
it's worth it."
It's also fun, she says. She is
the mother of two girls, both of
whom have rooms filled with
their mother's handiwork.
There's a clown, a teddy bear,
Mickey and Minnie Mouse. Of-
ten, the pictures feature such
charming touches as beads, a
miniature watch and chain, or
tiny pompons.
"My first piece was a profile
of a woman," Mrs. Conrad re-
calls. The work still hangs in her
front hall. "When I was finished,
I said, 'I can't believe I actually
did this.' "
Then she got daring. She be-
gan trying different stitches and
threads, sometimes creating de-
signs that echoed the theme of
the work (like wavy lines to sim-
ulate waves). "It gets easier, and
your work gets noticeably bet-
ter the more you do it," she says.