Welcome to Walter World

by Corrin Green

for JAVA Magazine

January, 2011

All is not as it seems with Walter, billed with only a slight wink as "The World's Largest VW Bus". Already gaining local fame as a show-stopper at parades and festivals, the status of this four-wheeled colossus as a rolling entertainment venue, minor engineering marvel and art piece is immediately evident.

And yet, even when housed out of public sight and with his engine off, Walter is always busy. For a small but growing number of people, this road-worthy piece of heavy equipment is ardently at work as a metaphor, a social experiment and, unlikely as it may sound, a spiritual leader.

Yes, really.

No one from Walter's previous incarnation could have guessed he'd someday reach such an exalted place. Long before people around Walter began addressing him in personal terms, as they do now, the 1963 Walter CF model crash truck was a definite it. Essentially a 10-ton fire truck, it first served at Luke Air Force base, where it sat at the ready in case of a plane crash.

In time, the Air Force sold the truck to the New River Fire Department, who used it until it became unreliable and they could presumably afford a more modern fire truck. New River sold it, cheap, to a man named Don, who had a collection of old, cool, vehicles sitting overlooking the town of Jerome.

And for five years, Jerome is where the 1963 Walter CF model crash truck, with a broken fly wheel and numerous other decrepitudes, sat, waiting for time and the elements to bring eventual ruin. People who spied it and the other vehicles sitting on the hill above the Gold King mine were free to climb on and in it. Barring an earthquake, almost no one could imagine the truck actually moving again.

The fateful exception to this was Dr. Kirk Strawn, a Valley doctor and entrepreneur. Kirk and some friends had driven his own customized Volkswagen bus to the Jerome Jamboree, an annual event held by the Arizona Bus Club.

"We'd gone up the mountain to see some of the old relics, most of whom were just junk and would never move...and there was Walter sitting there...and we said, 'this is the biggest (bleep)ing Volkswagen bus', cause he had these huge tires, short wheel base, and he looked like a bus, basically, but on a 2-1 scale", recalls Strawn.

Kirk's vision for the vehicle didn't stop there. During his and his friends' time at the Jerome Jamboree, the group imagined not only Walter's new look, but also his next mission. "I'd just learned about Burning Man and how they have these mutant vehicles. I'd never been there, but I wanted to go. He was a fire truck, so we knew he had water tanks with him...and we got the idea that if we misted at Burning Man, maybe it would attract the naked people."

Ah sex, creator of life and ten ton mutant party vehicles.

Burning Man is a gathering of thousands of like-minded people on a dry lake bed in Nevada, held annually on the week leading up to Labor Day. During the event, participants party heartily, share and share alike (outright commerce is nearly non-existent) and learn to live with their fellow revelers. The tenets of the event are radical self-expression, radical self-reliance, communal effort and immediacy. The idea is to slough off the shackles of the outside world for a week, have fun and get along with as few rules as possible.

A fundamental part of the Burning Man experience is randomness. With no agenda, the party goes where the party goes.

Kirk eventually traded his VW camper for the crash truck, which was trailered and transported to the Valley. Over the next few years, he attracted a cadre of artists and technicians to the project and Walter as we now know him took shape. Those involved refer to themselves as members of "Tribe Walter."

In 2009, Kirk's original plan to take Walter to Burning Man was finally realized, to his own delight and that of the sweaty, dust-encrusted celebrants. Walter arrived with new water tanks hooked to an array of spray nozzles to mist the crowd below, a bamboo dance floor on his upper deck, a 15,000 watt sound system driving fifty speakers, a laser array, and over 50k led lights.

The least discerning of readers will doubtless have noticed that Walter has no real connection to the Volkswagen Company, and yet Kirk insists that Walter is truly a VW bus in every way except origin. "When the VW bus came to the U.S., what it stood for was freedom. For the first time, it was easy for people without a lot of money to be anywhere in the country they wanted...you could sleep wherever you wanted and be freaky. Walter has that same spirit."

Back in the Valley, Walter spends his down time at the Walter Dome. Located at the Ponderosa Lumber facility on Thomas Road in Scottsdale, the Walter Dome has space for Walter and a couple hundred of his closest friends, and features a zen garden, performance stage, and wet bar. Future plans may include renting the Dome out for special events, though for now it's for tribal use only.

As Walter was being transformed, so, too, was Kirk's understanding of who Walter was and what he could achieve. The creativity and enthusiasm brought to the project by the tribe of electricians, artists, mechanics, and fabricators demonstrated the power of a diverse community who shared a common goal. Although Kirk was essentially bankrolling the endeavor, he felt he wasn't the one in the driver's seat. "The inertia of creation has just not stopped since day one", he reflects, enthusiastically. "I have no idea how the ideas have come to get us where we are now... about 100 people have had some significant role in the creation of this vehicle and every single person who's been involved has directed it in some way. There's no question it's taken on a life of its own".

As James Vito Palazzolo, tribe member and spokesman puts it, "Randomness is a big generator of the energy around here, and we just focus it." Very Burning Man, man. Ken Lemoine, who is bringing his decades of down-to-Earth business prowess to the project lifts the conversation to a still higher plane when he explains, "Walter's really the one in charge. We go where Walter wants to go." Everyone agrees.

And Walter is a very ambitious fellow. In addition to his slate of appearances, which the past month alone has included the Electric Light Parade and the Fiesta Bowl Parade, Walter has directed his tribe of followers to run a machine shop, and convert another part of the Ponderosa facility into a co-op micro-brewery. Yet another endeavor, the Walter Oil Company, will involve the collection of vegetable oil and its conversion to bio-fuel.

The trajectory of the Walter project has echoed that of Burning man in that both have found the need to somewhat temper their respective exercises in randomness and collective will with some practicalities of the outside world. In the case of Burning Man, this has meant the formulation of a small bureaucracy to handle logistics and finances, as well as a growing list of rules and regulations for attendees. For Walter, who has expensive appetites, this has meant finding ways to manage liability issues and generate revenue - not exactly the warm fuzzy part of anyone's utopian pipe dream.

"We're actually developing more structure just to make sure it's sustainable. We formed Walter LLC", says Kirk. "We're following an atypical business model in that the idea is really a NOT-for-profit business. We need to generate revenue to make the things the Walter project wants to do possible. None of us want to get rich off of Walter, but we want to provide a good place to work, where people can earn a fair wage and do good things - that's the general idea."

Kirk dismisses the notion that Walter's cache as a marketable curiosity will ever wane. "I'm not ready to accept that," he says. "The novelty will wear off unless you go with the personification thing, and everybody who meets Walter refers to him as 'Walter.' He has the ability to reinvent himself and not to fall into that trap of being just an object...he is a living, breathing thing."

"That's very much been a theme of the entire project, too, taking something that seemed old and worn out and giving it a new life. Not only Walter himself, but also the Walter Dome, which was kind of in disrepair before we converted it… recycling vegetable oil for use as fuel…all of it."

As for the scope of Walter's future reinvention, there is no hedging Kirk's sense of enthusiasm and earnestness on the topic. Changing Walter's propulsion system to a virtually emissions-free hydrogen power-plant is being researched, and Tribe Walter (and Kirk Strawn) has no lack of other ideas.

"In Europe, the way they're transporting very large things these days isn't on the roads, but by using a really OLD technology - blimps."

"I fully expect Walter to fly one day."

The Natural - Natalie Vie

(excerpted in JAVA Magazine, September, 2010)

Inside the dank helmet, moist with breath and sweat, the sound of your own respiration is as audible as the sounds in the hall around you. Thus insulated, your world narrows until there is only you and your opponent and the yard-long steel blade you each possess. Final salutes given, you now adopt the traditional stance. Knees bent, lead leg to the fore, trailing arm behind with elbow bent at 90 degrees and open hand pointing casually at the ceiling, sword forward with wrist up, elbow bent close to your body, ready to strike.

Ready to kill.

The stiff steel mesh an inch in front of your eyes all but disappears as your focus zeroes through to your opponent, six feet away and just as ready to kill YOU. Not so tough. Keep your confidence or they'll know it and smell blood. Then you're dead. Take an easy breath - the last one for a while - and release it slowly. Focus now. Look at nothing in particular, the better to see everything...

"En guarde!"

An involuntary but welcome adrenaline surge doubles your heart-rate and halves your perception time. You're prepared for action and you can barely wait. The record shows that six matches out of seven, your opponent has been the first to strike - usually at the face. Always in the upper area. When they do, you'll deflect that and stab their torso with the same lunge. Should they deflect that strike, you know exactly how you'll set yourself up for the next one. What are they waiting for?

Damn. Fine! Advance. Advance. They also advance. You're within striking distance now. Your blades meet almost casually in several small, swirling feints, each of you trying to draw the other out. Watching… watching…

Their shoulder drops and you instinctively move to block the lunge that will invariably follow. Except that this time it doesn't. This time the true attack happens just as you've become off-balance and un-guarded. You FOOL! Your blade scrapes theirs and jabs ineffectually at the air while the tip of your opponent's blade, with their full weight and power behind it, slams into your mid section. Were this not a game, the contents of your spleen would now be fouling your shoes.

Ask Olympic hopeful and four-time women's collegiate fencing champion Natalie Vie why she chose a sport derived from mortal combat and her initial answer is deceptively superficial. "I was reading a book, and the main character worked on the fencing team and...that just put the idea in my head…"

What she doesn't say, although true, is that she and championship fencing were made for one another.

Natalie Julia Vie was born in Los Angeles and raised in Phoenix, the eldest of four children. She credits the family responsibilities she undertook after her parents divorced and her mom began full-time work with keeping her on the straight and narrow; but it doesn't seem to have slowed her down much. A confirmed polymath, she can alternately and credibly describe herself as a writer, sculptor, fencer and coach. Active in sports from first grade on, Natalie competed in three prior to college: Swimming, track and...cheerleading.

"I was really into competitive cheerleading my whole life growing up and I know that sounds dorky, but I loved performing and challenging myself and the physicality of it." Fun as it was, though, Natalie was increasingly drawn to the more individual sports in which she was also involved. "I'd done cheer since first grade and it's just part of my personality that I stuck with it… but it ended up not being as fun for me as the swim team or the track team… the individual sports."

All sports went on the back-burner during her senior year in high school, when Natalie focused on academics and her role as editor of the school newspaper. It was also when she read Catcher In The Rye and, even though its depiction in the novel is decidedly lackluster, became curious to know more about fencing. She looked up local fencing clubs and, along with a friend, checked one out.

"My friends thought it was hilarious! 'Fencing? Who's ever heard of fencing?!' but at the same time they were super curious." Still, Natalie doesn't think they were too surprised. "I don't think they expected anything less from me because they knew I kind of go with my passions, and if I get an idea I just go after it."

Fencing was the right thing at the right time for Natalie. "Graduating high school left a huge void, especially in time, before college started." She also found that it satisfied her in ways that her previous activities hadn't. "It involved a mental aspect that I'd never found in the other sports I'd done, with the physicality and the fact that it was an individual rather than a team sport...so it was the perfect combination for me."

Of the three weapons used in Olympic competition, Natalie competes with the eppe' - the heaviest and most rigid, and the one whose rules allow the most freedom of form.

Though she began fencing at a relatively late age for a future champ, Natalie realized she'd actually been in training for years. "The competitive cheer I did outside of school was closely tied to a gymnastics program...and through that I really learned about rhythm and dancing and mastering my own body in terms of coordination - all the physical things that fencing requires. So it's almost as if I'd been leading up to this my whole life. When I came to fencing, it just felt natural."

Another natural thing may help explain Natalie's success. One of her great uncles, Julio de Caro, is considered by many to have been a prime progenitor of modern Tango; and for Natalie, who enjoys Latin dance herself, the footwork which carries her comparatively slight frame into battle exhibits an apparently effortless facility. An example of this can be seen on YouTube.com, in a video of highlights from Natalie's title-winning Duel in the Desert bout this past January in Las Vegas. Her opponent, also a world-class fencer, always searches out a solid footing. Natalie, in contrast, seems to be continuously moving to an inner rhythm; pivoting her hips as she shifts her weight back and forth. Her steps are more frequent, more evenly measured and more fluid. The more intense the action, the more Natalie seems to be dancing.

According to Natalie, a fencer's style is as unique as her finger print. "Even if I didn't know who was out there, I could tell who they were as soon as they started fencing." This is why several seasons ago she began taking notes on every fencer she might be matched against. She noted their strengths and vulnerabilities, patterns of behavior, and individual peculiarities. Natalie knows she can only take this so far, though. "Obviously, you try to avoid their strengths and exploit their weaknesses. But you can't rely on it," she says, "because as soon as you do, then they do something totally unpredictable and you're not ready for it. More than that, the whole process of taking the notes helps me keep my focus the entire time while I'm waiting for a bout."

In the few short years since she began fencing, included four years on ASU's Salle Diablo Fencing Club, Natalie has earned bachelors degrees in both Political Science and Sculpture (graduating magna cum laude), and competed in fencing championships in five different countries, some multiple times.

Despite her relatively brief time at the sport, she has racked up an enviable ratio of wins, including four U.S. championship titles. In fact, her win/loss ratio suggests she would be evenly matched in the highest echelon of women fencers in the U.S., the top four of which will automatically earn a spot on the 2012 U.S. Olympic team.

If only it was that easy. Due to the way fencing rankings are calculated, (cumulatively and with the lowest three scores discarded) a dominant fencer's ranking will generally improve the more bouts they are able to compete in. In countries which sponsor their athletes, this isn't a problem, and rankings are likely to have a direct correlation to raw talent. U.S. fencers, on the other hand, must pay their own way to every event. Here, talent is necessary for a high ranking, but not sufficient. A fencer also needs funds.

Natalie has a job coaching up-and-coming athletes at Phoenix Falcons fencing club, which is one of the few employers able to understand and work with her unique scheduling requirements. Up until final Olympians are selected in April of 2012, she will have the opportunity to travel to as many as twelve competition per year worldwide. That's a lot of time off, and a lot of airfare, lodging and fees to pay for.

And of course Natalie's not alone. The roster of U.S. fencers tends to be younger than their international counterparts - a competitive disadvantage in a sport where experience is an asset - due to the fact that there is no living to be made from it. Also, unlike many other countries, the U.S. does not subsidize their Olympic athletes. "We have an incredibly young team...once you leave college there's no support system. It's sad, but that's the truth."

That's not to say that U.S. fencers aren't competitive, all things being equal. Far from it. In fact, in the last two olympics, of the six medalists in the sabre category, FIVE were Americans. What leveled the playing field somewhat for sabre was that it was a new olympic adoption, and so all of the competitors were new to the sport on the Olympic level. The oldest forms of Olympic fencing, which use either the epee' of foil, however, are still dominated by Europeans.

French fencers are rock stars in their home country, where champs can be certain not only of sponsorship, but also career-spanning endorsement deals, paid guest spots and the like. In many ways the sport perpetuates itself through personality in Europe much the way that U.S. basketball does here, where the public is always looking to the next Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, LeBron James, etc.

"If you think of any popular sport, one of the biggest factors is the individual athletes and whether you care about their story or not," Natalie reflects, "and so I think if we start to put our athletes forward that will only be good for U.S. fencing."

There is a long way to go before the sport gets mainstream recognition here (and pro soccer looms as a prescient example of the difficulty of an internationally adored sport to usurp any of the attention we give to the big 5 of baseball, basketball, football, golf and NASCAR); but if anyone can turn some heads to it, it's probably Natalie Vie. She has not only the captivating mix of sex appeal, athleticism and ambition necessary to gain attention, but also the intellect and grounding to maintain it.

Would SHE like to become the popular figurehead of U.S. fencing? "I have a lot of support here in Phoenix and a lot excitement from people at my club and I love it when some of the kids at the club look up to me, but... the most important thing to me is that I get my tournaments paid for. I'm not looking to get famous - I want to be an international player and get as good as I can get."

Heidi Abrahamson

For JAVA Magazine, July-August, 2010

A scene in the middle of the film The Lion In Winter depicts captive 12th century English Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine at her dressing table, surrounded by the various and sundry baubles befitting a female monarch of the Middle Ages. She chooses a ring with which to bribe her guard. Like the stones which built the surrounding castle, her jewelry seems roughly-hewn and elemental - ostentatious for its boldness rather than the intricacy of its detail. Size certainly mattered, with large jewels held fast by large metal bands. She was, after all, Queen.

Flash forward to the 20^th century and "modern" design. The very term (and its derivatives) has different connotations, depending on the specific field of endeavor, be it architecture, painting, jewelry, etc., but can probably best be defined in terms of what it is not. It is expressly not anything that preceded it. Not Victorian, not Baroque, not able to be defined on any terms but its own. By equal measure both carefree and highly self-conscious, "modernist" jewelry could have extremes of form with zero function, or it could have extremes of function and minimal form. It can make ones head spin to try and nail down the term, which is largely the point.

Seemingly at the union of these two design worlds has emerged the jewelry of local artist Heidi Abrahamson, who conjures her wares, item by item, in a small studio within the former warehouse space in which also resides Phoenix Metro Retro, a showcase of mid-century modern furniture on Hazelwood, just west of Seventh Avenue in Phoenix.

Heidi's parents immigrated from Germany in the 1950's, looking to restart their life in the States where, out from under the cloud of Nazi defeat and ruin, all things still seemed possible. Settling in Indiana, the couple took stable jobs and started their family.

Family lore has it that that the course of their lives changed one day when Heidi's mother made an impetuous purchase. "She'd seen this interesting vase at the Salvation Army shop and just had to have it. My father thought it was really kind of silly to spend so much money on a second-hand vase, when money was so tight for us, but mom really thought the vase was special." It turns out Heidi's mother had an excellent eye. The vase was an Amphora, designed by a popular designer of the avant guard. Before long, a buyer for the vase had been found and the family had made a tidy profit.

Thus began a decades-long immersion into the world of resale which over the years would grow from a hobby to a way of life. Long before eBay made the practice all but obsolete, Heidi's family would scour estate sales, auctions and the like, for objects whose value was underestimated by sellers who didn't really know what they had. They would then bring those finds to gathering places throughout the midwest, and resell them to people who valued them more greatly. "They don't do it like that these days, but my mother used to put up curtains and really decorate the selling space at these shows we were selling at. It was really pretty cool," recalls Heidi.

Although the family was living in a large Victorian-era house in Columbus, Indiana, Heidi's parents were gung-ho for modernism. "My parents used to drive the us through town and point out all the cool buildings with modern design influences. Especially being from Germany, they'd get really excited when they'd find something like a Bauhaus influence or something," she says.

Unlike the average child, Heidi soaked it all up; both the elements of style, which were such a departure from her Victorian surroundings at home, and even the names of architects and designers her parents enthusiastically imparted to her. "We'd drive into Chicago and they'd say, 'look - there's a Frank Lloyd Wright' or 'there's a Mied van der Rohe!'"

It was in high school that Heidi became drawn to the possibilities of silver as a medium for jewelry and art. She was particularly attracted to works of such contemporary silversmiths as N.E. From, Georg Jensen, Andreas Mikkelson, Esther Lewittes, Ed Levin.

Heidi studied fine arts and interior design at Indiana University and eventually moved to Seattle, Washington, where she began a career in visual merchandising. She planned and executed in-store decorations for some of the elite retailers in the city, including I. Magnin, Burberry's and the Bon Marche'.

It was in Seattle that Heidi met and married Douglas Abrahamson, who shared her eclectic tastes. After briefly returning to Indiana, Heidi and Doug moved their young family to Phoenix in the summer of 1995.

During her time in the Valley, Heidi began to pursue outside interests, such as desert landscaping (she has a degree in it from Desert Botanical Gardens) and beaded jewelry. Following a desire to have more creative possibilities than she felt were allowed her by stringing beads, Heidi eventually re-acquainted herself with silver. Although she still describes herself as "primarily self-taught," she has taken courses in casting, smithing and stone-setting.

What "self-taught" usually means is lots of experimentation, and Heidi's body of work reflects that. While certain themes recur (the juxtaposition of circles with spheres, for example), overall there is an unbridled crossing of genres and styles.

One stylistic trait evident in many of her rings is that of semi-precious stones encased in broad bands of silver, where the sides of the band actually extend beyond the apex of the stone. Tending toward a muted color palate, many of Heidi's pieces feature stones of dull amber (such as yellow quartz) side by side with stones of complimentary red and/or blue hues.

Pearls are a favorite feature, says Heidi, because of the possibilities for quirky or ironic mountings. One pendant features a shallow dish of silver, with a pearl placed off-center inside the dish. A silver and gold ring features a perfectly flat top, upon which is mounted several pearls in tight alignment. One silver ring features a pool of dark onyx atop which a white pearl seams to float.

There is both motion and tension in Heidi's designs.

Another successful and eye-catching theme is that of large quartz crystals placed within, instead of atop, vertical straps of silver. Some of these rings must be placed on the finger of the wearer horizontally until past the wearer's knuckle.

Tall and with the fair complexion and flaxen hair characteristic of her German lineage, Heidi Abrahamson has a broad, unguarded smile, and an infectious laugh. Though clearly serious about her work and her art, she also displays a healthy sense of humor. When asked if any of her design concepts have ever proved plain unwearable, she spontaneously guffaws, "Oh GOD yes!"

To say that Heidi is still learning her craft would be accurate but misleading. Each finished piece is a cohesive work which

achieves the goals Heidi had for it; but as her technical skills grow, so too do her expectations of herself and her work.

Last September, Heidi was invited to attend the "Ormania" trade show, an annual "selling exhibition" held in Paris, France. Heidi was surprised and honored at her inclusion in the exhibition, which seeks out the best of unique jewelry making the world over. "I didn't apply or lobby for it," she explains. "It was members of a silver forum I belong to who put my name forward."

Heidi is visibly moved when she reflects on the recognition she's received from peers and others with influence in the jewelry world. Her creations have already been displayed as jewelry as well as art at venues such as the Herberger Theater, Red Door Gallery, SMoCA and the Phoenix Modern Expo '09.

Although popular among those in the know, Heidi Abrahmson is still approachable - probably even more so if you happen to catch her at Bikini Lounge, one of her and Doug's favorite hangouts. Her "brand" is also not yet so big that she wouldn't consider commission work, and has designed custom wedding bands for clients in the past.

You can visit Heidi in her studio at Phoenix Metro Retro (which she and her husband own) at 708 West Hazlewood in Phoenix. They're open Wednesday to Sunday, 11am to 6pm. Her website is www.heidiabrahamson.com.

Studio Joy Li

for JAVA Magazine, June, 2010

In modern relationship terminology, fashion is bad for us. Time after time it betrays us, and yet we keep going back to it. Even as we remain hopeful, we eventually learn not to put much faith in it.

Rightly so. By its very nature, fashion is an inconsistent and unpredictable partner. Sometimes the traits we initially found charming end up being plain annoying, and it stays around way too long. Other times, just when we think we're ready to settle down and make a long-term commitment, it comes through the door with a crappy new tattoo and an expensive habit and makes us wonder how we could have been so blind to its true nature. Oh fashion - "I don't know you anymore."

The truth is, fashion was always just too self-centered and mercenary to be trusted. How many of us have made the mistake of investing our hearts, only to find that the same pants we thought we understood like no other, will drop for just about anyone with a credit card or a cheap compliment? Fashion uses us and loses us...but still makes us want it.

To flip the (admittedly shaky) metaphor: The purpose of the fashion industry is to get us to stick around - to continue shelling out money in the desperate hope of not being left behind. In a partnership with fashion, any sense that we're in control is merely the result of mind games.

What's worse, and not at all metaphorical or funny, is that the fashion industry has a sad history of overlooking human rights abuses in favor of increased profits.

As you may have guessed, I am not the best choice for a fluff piece on "fashion." Not only am I cynical by nature, but...actually, "cynical by nature" pretty much does sum it up. Thankfully, I met someone related to the world of pret-a-porter with whom I couldn't agree more.

Joy Li, the designer behind Studio Joy Li on Stetson Drive in Scottsdale, has looked at the fashion industry from every angle in her 25-year career, and some of what she's seen has not been pretty. Along with her business partner, Jean Bartolomei, she has begun a design and manufacturing business that is meant to be the exception and perhaps eventually the rule - a partnership between consumer and fashion based upon mutual satisfaction and no guilt.

Studio Joy Li seeks to restore our faith in women's fashion. There is good reason to think they will succeed.

It would be easy to assume that Joy Li's success in the industry was a foregone conclusion. She's beautiful, articulate, self-assured and energetic. Though in her forties, she still has the figure that once inspired ready-to-wear mogul Liz Claiborne to make Joy THE shape of the Claiborne petit model in the 1980's ("I had to lay down in this stuff and they made a mold out of me…then they made dress forms out of the mold.") She has a degree in graphic design from Carnegie Mellon University. Isn't that enough?

"I was LUCKY!" she says more than once, when describing her circuitous rise to independence in the fashion business. And it was luck, both good and bad, along with her innate talents, which brought her to where she is today; bringing both practicality and a conscience to Studio Joy Li.

The first-born child of Chinese immigrant parents, Joy grew up in Buffalo, New York. "We didn't have toys." Instead, Joy expressed her creativity by drawing paper doll designs on the window panes. Still, the choice of a career in fashion was a non-starter as far her father was concerned. "My father always said that the fashion business was bad because it exploited Chinese labor," she says.

One stroke of luck was that Joy's father had been a graduate of Carnegie Mellon University. "I still couldn't take fashion, but since [her dad] had gone there, too, he didn't mind when I took Graphic Design because it was Carnegie Mellon." Though not fashion-oriented, this education gave Joy what she needed in the way of conceptual design fundamentals.

After university, Joy found graphic design work with a Fortune 500 company in Connecticut. One day she saw an in ad in the New York Times, looking for a petit fit model at Liz Claiborne in New York City. "I took the train into New York City and I got the job on the spot," remembers Joy.

Today, the Liz Claiborne company owns many other labels, such as Kenneth Cole, Kate Spade and Lucky Brand Jeans. Between the late 1970's and late 1980's, however, Ms. Claiborne herself was still in control and in the middle of the company's first major growth explosion. Joy had the luck of joining the company during this phase and the opportunity to learn from the master herself.

As a fit model, Joy was part of a small team which would fly to factories around the world where items for the Liz Claiborne brand were manufactured. Being the definition of what was then considered a size 6 (a 2 by modern standards), Joy would try on prototype clothing inside the factory. "Usually we'd put on the samples and then we'd go over the fit - Liz was always there - I'd say this is where it's a little snug or not quite right...then we'd be on our own until they were able to re-make the sample and call us back for another fitting. I always had a pager on me."

Often, Claiborne would be right beside Joy in the fitting room. "Liz would actually strip down and try on clothes right next to me...she was involved in everything...she really wanted to make sure that the quality was consistent. The goal was for all the clothes to fit exactly the same, no matter where in the world they were manufactured."

One challenge for Joy during this time in her life was that she needed to maintain a consistent body shape throughout the year. "It was a challenge because when I started, I was lifting weights...and then they told me that my arms were starting to get too big...also, on some of these trips maybe I'd get sick and so I'd maybe lose a little weight…"

This was clearly a pivotal and formative period for Joy, and one that she remembers with reverence. "I wasn't making much money, but I was living high and learning about the business," she recalls. "...I wanted to get in to fashion design so bad, but I hadn't gone to school for it. Usually that meant you'd have to start as a receptionist or something and try to work your way up." Joy's foot in the door was undoubtedly more fun than that.

Within two years, Joy had transitioned from model to designer when she accepted a role at Claiborne competitor Carol Little. Other jobs followed, including ones at Guess and Newport Blue Men's.

One incident during this period brought Joy back to Earth and served to mature her thinking as regards fashion and its place in our lives. A family emergency called her briefly to China, where the contrast between the lives of the coastal U.S. fashion set and those of the average Chinese citizen could not have been more pronounced. While frivolous fashions may have artistic significance, and may be fun, Joy started thinking more about clothing that was easy to live in.

In 2001, Joy relocated to the Valley, where she decided the time and place were right to strike out and do things her own way. Two tenets of Joy's "way" were specific corrections in the path she had watched the fashion business take over the course of her career.

The first of these was that the core of Joy's collection would be fundamentals of women's clothing that were meant to be kept for several seasons instead of tossed after only one. These would employ state of the art fabrics that kept their shape and resisted wear. Designed with equal emphasis to form as well as function, the pants, skirts, shirts and dresses in the Fundamentals line come in core colors of black, white and grey and can be mixed and matched with anything else in a woman's wardrobe.

Other lines, while more to the fore stylistically, still employ the ethos of wearability and matchability. Joy describes the brand as "for the woman going from the gym to the office or for the jet-setter who believes that Europe is possible with a single carryon."

The second intentional divergence from what many consider the fashion business mainstream is Studio Joy Li's commitment to fair treatment of the people who make the clothing that bears her brand. All the clothing in every Joy Li line is manufactured in the United States, with Joy and business partner Jean Bartolomei making frequent visits to the factories.

Though Joy doesn't want to isolate any of her past employers as particularly deserving of scorn, she has vivid memories of working conditions that repulsed her. "I'm talking women who had ropes tied to their arms so they had to pull enormous, heavy boxes across the floor…" The words of Joy's father about the exploitation inherent in the fashion business were given vivid detail. "I've quit jobs because of what I saw," she says.

Was there anywhere in the world where it was particularly prevalent?

"In every country in Asia."

Studio Joy Li is located in the Mix group of shops on Stetson Drive in Scottsdale's "SouthBridge District." There, all of Joy's current lines are on display in a showroom that is crisp, airy and bright. Joy encourages women to give her feedback and become real fans. American labor and small runs of fine fabrics mean that clothing from Studio Joy Li is not priced to compete with J.C. Penny; but it is more than reasonable considering the craftsmanship and exclusivity of the line. Prices typically range from tops in the $60's to outerwear in the high $400's.

There are, however, exceptions if you're among the Studio Joy Li in-crowd. "We hold a twice-a-year sample sale. I want to keep it fresh, so we'll have a box where anything in it is $20 and another where everything is $40 and so on."

And the future? "I definitely want to expand the size range. Right now it would be too expensive to offer more sizes than we do." Joy also sees philanthropy and sponsorship in the brand's future, but first things first.

There are a couple of ways to keep current with Studio Joy Li. The best is to stop by the shop at 7144 E. Stetson Drive, Suite 100 in Scottsdale. She also has a Twitter feed, which is studiojoyli, or you can visit the website at JoyLi.net.

JAVA Country Bar Roundup

For JAVA Magazine - May, 2010

(Miss Brittany Doster at Shotgun Betty's)

This ain't yer grand-pappy's Western scene, young 'un. The days when REAL cowboys frequented bars in the downtowns of Phoenix, Scottsdale or Tempe ended in the 1970's, if not earlier, and the establishments which catered to them ended as well. What replaced them were bars, steak restaurants and lounges which chose western-ness as a theme to attract the growing tourist and college dollars.

If you seriously want to get in with the crowd that knows how to castrate a bull (properly, I mean), then you'll have to head out of town. Go to Wickenburg, Casa Grande or Coolidge. Just remember, REAL ranch folk party a little differently. They're up and out before dawn, and in the sack (sleeping) by 8pm.

If you want to get your country groove on, but do NOT want to have to feign interest in the latest hilarious insemination mishap, the Valley proper has you covered. The past few years have seen the emergence of several new venues for those looking to scoot their boots, along with the demise of others. Here we present a roundup of some of the hottest of the kicker bars in the area. One thing is for sure in the Valley - when it comes to Western, there's something for nearly everybody, even if you don't own a hoof pick.

Hot Off The Grill Country

When trends ignite, club owners scramble to cash in, and the collection of clubs that spring up are often a mixed bag. Such is the case in downtown Scottsdale at the moment, where three new clubs are hoping to ride the current cow-person trend through to the end. They are Saddle Ranch Chophouse, Shotgun Betty's and Revolver. One of these places definitely has some charm.

Saddle Ranch (Scottsdale Rd between Fifth Avenue and Drinkwater) is the Western bar Disney would build if Disney still built bars. It's sort of like a double decker Cracker Barrel restaurant, but with booze and more expensive meat. Although the space is cavernous, the central mechanical bull ring doesn't leave much room for dancing, unless it's in the main thoroughfare to the bathrooms. There's a lot of staff running around talking to one another, but they seem to leave the patrons pretty much alone.

While the mechanical bull is a unique attraction in the area, it doesn't take long to figure out that it's not the "bull's" good side you have to get on, but the dude in the booth with his hand on his joystick, CONTROLLING the bull. Basic rule: Hottie girls stay on as the dude bumps and grinds them via his cyber-bovine proxy / too-drunk frat guys get spanked (not in a good way.) Though this may be a suitable ethos in many respects, it spoils the notion that chance or skill are really at play, and means that the bull thing gets boring real fast. If you DO decide to ride, however, remember to tip the joystick dude. Got yer back.

One final word about Saddle Ranch - I was referred to their publicist in L.A. for all comments, and the monitors throughout the place were playing Lady Gaga, Jay Z and Usher. Make of that what you will.

Shotgun Betty's, just down the street at Stetson and Wells Fargo, is a better bet. It's just as inauthentic (when did the country aesthetic and the 1990's Poison video one combine?) but a better place to hang your hat for a couple hours.

Just to get it out of the way, if you haven't heard, it's owned and operated by the same person that owns Skin Caberet, and is his take on the type of bar made famous in the movie Coyote Ugly, where the bar girls get on top of the bar and put on a show periodically. The girls employed seem to be between the ages of 21 and 22, and have a body fat percentage somewhere in the 12% - 15% range. They're dressed in daisy dukes, boots and cowboy hats, and the Western theme pretty much ends there, visually.

It's a small and semi-dark place once night falls, and the walls are lined with tall, cozy banquets. The dancers are there when you want some eye candy, but it's also possible to sit back, have fun with your friends and get pleasantly bombed without the typical Scottsdale meat market mentality taking over. Shotgun Betty's is fun and doesn't take itself too seriously. In that way, it actually does kind of embody the old country spirit.

Besides their nubility, the bar and cocktail staff also seem to actually care about the patrons. They are present enough to be there when you need them, and they pay as much attention to the women as the men. Score one for good, old-fashioned hospitality - a much welcome return to form for Old Town!

Three doors to the west on Stetson, a new club called Revolver has taken over the space once occupied by Six. Revolver describes itself as "western chic." Seems like the same old vibe, though, and you'd be damned before you find any decor from farther west than Chicago. Fortunately they kept the absolute best part of Club Six - the bathrooms. There may be a reason (besides the bathrooms) to go here, but not if you're looking for anything remotely cowboy or western.

Old Country

(Model: Anakaren Slazar)

The Rusty Spur (Main Street in old town) beats Handlebar J's (just north of Shea) by a couple of years, 1958 versus 1960, but surely there's room enough for both under the heading of "oldest western bar in town." Your experience at either would be just about what you would have had there thirty years ago. The wood is real, the live country music is real, and they are both locally owned and operated. They were ALWAYS places that attracted a large percentage of tourists versus locals, but at least at this point they're authentically OLD places that do so. In a town that does very little to preserve its real past in favor of pandering to winter visitors and college kids with the latest re-interpretation, their very survival all these years merits you stopping in at least occasionally.

The Rusty Spur, in particular, is ripe for a local revival! This Summer, after the tourists have gone and ASU is on hiatus, this is the place to be. No table is too far from the bar to yell for another round,

or too far from the stage to join in on a verse of "Cold, Cold Heart."

An honorable mention must at this point go to The Coach House Tavern, located on Indian School Road, at Goldwater. It's not particularly country/western (the only real nod to the genre being an old wagon wheel nailed over the entrance,) but it's another leftover from a city that once proclaimed itself "The West's Most Western Town." A determinedly un-pretentious hole-in-the-wall, the Coach House has been the neighborhood bar of choice for locals for fifty years and continues to go strong. A large patio was added not too long ago, which doubled its capacity, but the heart of the bar is still a small, dark and funky room with decades of residue in the cracks. It's easy to find patrons who have been coming for twenty years or more, no matter when you visit. With drink prices approaching half of what you would pay at some of the surrounding clubs, it's no wonder, either.

Cattle Baron (people who own people who own cows) Country

The Stockyards Restaurant (Washington, just west of 48^th Street) is another hold-over from the Valley's past that has retained much of it's original character and mission. Though difficult to imagine now, as recently as the early 1970's, there was an enormous cattle yard located between Van Buren and Washington at 48^th street. At one time it was the largest in the world, and old-time residents can attest that it smelled like it, too. Beginning in 1954, The Stockyards Restaurant sat on a small elevation usually just upwind (to the south.)

The Tovrea family which owned the meat packing company and the restaurant were local upper-crusters, and The Stockyards became the meeting place for the men (such were the times) who made Arizona happen. Backs were slapped, deals were sealed and pesky investigative reporters plotted against in the overstuffed leather booths. Though cleaner and much less stuffy since a 2005 renovation, it is just as quietly iconoclastic as ever, and the hand-carved mahogany bar is still a sight to behold.

The Stockyards Restaurant is the Durant's of the western crowd. It's just right for those nights when you got $200 bucks to blow and only a nice sippin' whiskey and a charred chunk of large quadruped will do. You know what I'm talkin about.

Alt Country

For men and women who dig men and women, respectively, there's a happening and locally famous bar at Camelback and 7^th Avenue in Phoenix called Charlie's. Long before Brokeback Mountain lifted the weathered canvas veil on same-sex kicker love, Charlie's was strumming that crowd's tune. Now celebrating its 25^th year, Charlie's remains the premier place in the Valley where couples can do the Texas two-step cheek-cheek, toe-to-toe, and scruffy beard to scruffy beard. It's a wild Western place, actually, renown as much for being fun as for being gay. LOTS of straight people go, too, because Charlie's knows how to have a good time, western style. Just leave your inhibitions at the door and nobody gets hurt, yuh hear?

Big Country

There is an entire class of country club which doesn't aim to be anybody's cozy watering hole - they want to attract people by the heard, and they do! Mostly off the beaten path, where lower real estate prices help make a basketball arena-sized bar more viable, clubs such as Graham Central Station, Whiskey River, Tom Ryans and Toby Keith's "I Love This Bar and Grill" load people in by the thousands. Whether you're line dancing, seeing a country band or just getting loaded, bring a posse - a BIG one. You'll need them to hold your seat when you hike to the bathroom!

We've focused on just a few interesting places, but by no means is this sampling of western night life exhaustive. In a city with the footprint of the greater Phoenix metro area, there are tons of out-of-the-way places and many of them attract a more or less countrified crowd. Find em and tell your friends. Stick them in the pocket of your Lee jeans and make em your own.