THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, March 1, 1995 TAG: 9503010028
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY CAMMY SESSA, SPECIAL TO THE DAILY BREAK
LENGTH: Medium: 98 lines
SOME 16 YEARS AGO, Nancy Thomas decided to dump her job as a secretary in a Peninsula hospital so she could stay home and make wooden angels.
While holding a sample angel, her boss looked at it and said: `You're going to leave this good job to do THAT?' ''
The concept she started in her garage is now a $1 million-a-year business.
``And growing,'' says Thomas. ``I have to pinch myself to believe all this is happening.''
Her folk art is known throughout the world through museums, catalogs, folk-art publications, department stores, word-of-mouth and her charming Yorktown shop. Her designs have been in movies and on an official White House Christmas tree.
If that wasn't enough, Nancy Thomas has hit pay dirt in the fashion business. Her unique folk designs are now translated into wearable art and will be available come fall in the Marisa Christina line of sweaters.
All this occurred without Thomas setting foot on Seventh Avenue.
``It happened out of the blue,'' she says. ``The company came to me. They saw my art work in a catalog and gave me a call.''
Her little-girl enthusiasm belies her entrepreneurial acumen. She almost jumps in the air and claps her hands telling about her success.
``I think about it and try to be objective, but I can't,'' she says. ``To think from a little angel in my garage into a business growing by leaps and bounds, is amazing. It's nothing I've ever planned. It's just something that kind of evolved.
``When I started, it wasn't a drive for money or fame. It was an energy bubbling up inside that I had to get out.''
She shows off sweater designs. One has figures and helter-skelter stars on a dark background; another shows horizontal patterns of Thomas' famous angels. One sweater has the likeness of a lamb curled up with an angel on its back.
All the sweaters are scheduled for July delivery in stores throughout the country.
``This is exciting for me to think that my business is expanding in new directions,'' she says as she walks through her store to an adjoining house that once was a restaurant but is now her studio and her home. ``I live and work here,'' she says about the place that is as comfortable as Nancy, as she sits in an overstuffed sofa in relaxed pants and a loose jacket.
When she started, she was 40. ``I wanted extra money so I could collect antiques,'' she says. Also one of her three daughters was off to college. She was gambling on being successful.
Besides angels, Thomas began working on other folk motifs. She took samples around to local galleries and stores but was rejected in all but one place. Even the Yorktown outlet for local artists, ``On the Hill,'' refused her work, but Thomas was determined.
It caught on within the year because Thomas had the chutzpah to write and send photos of her work to Mary Emmerling, author of ``Collecting American Country'' book. Emmerling, who was based in New York, was interested, so Thomas packed her wares in a truck and drove to The Big Apple.
Emmerling was impressed and sponsored two shows for Thomas, with one resulting in a write-up in The New York Times. Subsequently, Thomas' angels were on permanent display at The Museum of American Folk Art.
Back in Yorktown, Thomas got an important telephone call. ``This is the White House,'' said the voice at the other end. Thomas thought it was a joke and answered: ``Oh sure, uh huh.. . . ''
It was no joke but a presidential request asking Thomas to craft 100 folk art ornaments for the official White House Christmas tree.
That was 1981, and since then, Thomas has been considered one of America's foremost folk artists. Her pieces were in the movie ``Tootsie,'' have been featured in the Wild Bird Society of Japan, and in 1993, she copped the High Design Award at the Atlanta Gift Mart. She's had many commissions including a 6-foot Uncle Sam for Yorktown's Victory Center, eight life-size paintings of St. Nicholas for Colonial Williamsburg, angels for the cast of the award-winning play ``Angels in America'' and a Statue of Liberty.
Her bread-and-butter pieces, however, are her paintings on wood, which are available though catalogs, department stores, galleries and her own shop. Thomas is enthused that her art is expanding in new directions.
She recalls that in her first year, her husband, Charles, helped when he could. Otherwise, she was doing all the work herself. It was grueling, and she probably cleared about $6,000.
Now she works on new and original paintings, but the nitty-gritty of keeping production going takes 12 employees.
``I think that I'm motivated more now than I was in the beginning,'' Thomas said. ``This is so exciting, and I want to keep on growing.'' MEMO: The Nancy Thomas Shop is on Burton Street in Yorktown. Hours are 10 a.m.
to 5 p.m. weekdays; 1 to 5 p.m., Sundays. Call 898-3665 for additional
information. ILLUSTRATION: Color photos by D. Kevin Elliott, Staff
Laura Thomas models a sweater...
Above: Nancy Thomas' folk designs will be available in the fall in
the Marisa Christina line of sweaters.
Left: Thomas' famous angels also appear on her sweaters.
by CNB