There are dreams that live in your body for a long time and when you recall them, all those feelings just flood right back in, fresh as the day you had it.
This was one of those dreams I thought of when McKenzie & Elliott of Pure Hart Studio reached out to share their Woodstock collab idea- A series of talks with local artists based on a dream they had to spark a conversation and create a collaborative T-Shirt design. (See below for their take on the process!)
22 years ago, I was pregnant with my daughter and had this dream.
The Dream: I hiked up to the rock ledge of Overlook Mountain (in Woodstock) with my young child. When we got there she just ran right over the ledge. Right. And then I immediately ran over the edge after her. Simple, fast, no hesitation, no thinking, I had no choice, no choice.
Not a nightmare, even though it sounds like one. It was just some kind of pull the rug out from under your feet, floating groundlessness vibe. It didn’t feel bad, albeit scary, but I wasn’t terrified, we were just ‘out there’.
The Space Hoodie is the crystallization of my talks with McKenzie & Elliott about that dream. It was a truly shared process. An inspired, joyful and surprising back and forth ball toss. Couches, coffee, babies, dogs & sharing. An unfolding of ideas that started with the dream and meandered to the void, the expansive abyss, standing on the edge, everything and nothing, inroads, doorways, rivers, free diving, keeping it moving and keeping it simple.
The talk and the design process were each their own individually lived parts and we went way out there. It began to really distill when I honed in on this beautiful card of theirs that kept resonating with me.
And when I read back over the transcription of our talk, I am amazed to find that what we really did was to come back around to the beginning.
Changed, but same.
‘Yeah. I mean, thinking about the word 'beyond' and, like, how can I live in the beyond space?. How do I bridge reality with the infinite? How do I LIVE MY LIFE?’
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Hoodies ship in early February!
The Space Hoodie- Mckenzie & Elliott of Pure Hart Studios
“We’re already in the abyss” is a weirdly satisfying sentence to hear from someone. It’s a reminder that we’re all in this together, and there’s a name for it, and the name is for something indescribable—at once far darker than anything we can comprehend, and infinitely more joyful, and also just…beyond.
This was Michele Quan’s conclusion about halfway into our nearly 3-hour discussion about dreams, art, and Woodstock. We have admired Michele and her gorgeous, enchanting work at MQuan Studio for years. So much so, that her ceramics have become permanently intertwined with our concept of Woodstock. So when we had the idea to explore collaborating with local (/international) creatives through talking about their dreams, she was at the top of our list; and we were very happy to hear that she was into it.
So we sat down with her in her studio on an appropriately shimmery October day, and she told us her dream:
It was before her daughter Elsie was born. Or maybe not—but yeah, probably so; because leading up to this dream, Michele used to have sensations—nearly visions, but something less literal than that—of Elsie walking down the hallway as a presence.
This dream begins on a familiar hike up Overlook Mountain—a trek Michele makes often, and something of a regular pilgrimage for Woodstock locals. Elsie is just ahead of her—a young child. They pass wildflowers as they approach the overlook cliff itself; and then Elsie just runs right over the edge. In this realm, over the edge does not lead down the mountainside—it opens up into the void. Pure and utter timeless uncertainty.
Michele has no choice. There is no choice; so there is no hesitation. She runs off the edge after her.
This leap was not a negative experience, she explains. “Not negative––necessary. What was I gonna do? Stay back?”
Talking about the dream burst the dam open of the conversation, which was engrossing and free-flowing, covering topics like:
- Happy accidents in the creative process
- How green and purple are similar
- Fishing With John featuring Tom Waits
- Nothing matters and everything matters––tell all the kids
- The Observer Effect
- The Heart Sutra
- The elusive mechanics of dream-swimming in the sky
- Maurice Sendak’s life advice
- Unsandwiched time
- WIlly Wonka’s flying death elevator
- Life is a river
- The Four Reminders
- The Ten Thousand Things
- Ten-minute coffee meditation
- Astral projecting into childhood memories that you don’t remember from photos
- Is it the abyss, or are there twin abysses?
- Doomscrolling as actual metaphysical descent
- Hawking Radiation
- Those strange qualities of Woodstock that create extra potent dreams
These would make for pretty intriguing chapter titles; but we were hoping to design a hoodie together.
We all agreed on the overall goal—not just a quick design on a random garment. We wanted something special. Something that we would wear, but couldn’t find anywhere. Something that has meaning but universal. Something chic, stylish, probably sorta minimalist, reflecting our individual and collective creative voices. So we started processing the dream, the conversation, the themes.
Over the following weeks, it began to take shape. Interestingly, it mirrored the first few minutes of our discussion. The concept wasn’t a literal or intellectual interpretation of the dream—it was a feeling. A feeling of in-between moments, uncertainty, connection, slipperiness, emptiness. A feeling of space. A space to get lost in nothingness, or a space to just “live your life, live your life, live your life” (Maurice Sendak).
It isn’t that the void isn’t real, or terrifying. It absolutely is. Because deep down, we all know that nothing really matters. As the Second Reminder…reminds us: we are all going to die. And as the Fourth reminds us, samsara is an ocean of suffering. The void, the abyss, the black hole—it doesn’t care. And, as we all know, nothing escapes a black hole.
But also, that isn’t true. Something does escape. And something lives on. And nothing is ever anything forever. As Michele told Elsie when, as a teenager, she would say ‘nothing matters’: “That’s true. And also, everything matters.”
This is the Space Hoodie. It feels really good wearing it. There are simple but powerful energetics on the sleeve and hood—a crescent moon and a sunburst. You can feel them. The back print is kinda magical. It has a gravity, a cryptic presence—the void, the doorway, the stars, and the stars escaping (this was the final touch on the design that made us know it was ready).
The design isn’t contained by a border, and printed in low contrast against the charcoal garment. It quietly haunts. We may fear this place but we also dive in head first to follow anything or anyone we care about. We decide what the void is. The void is us, in motion. And, if we let ourselves, we find each other there.
Maybe it’s the same place we found ourselves in this conversation—the dream space, the collective unconscious. Maybe we’re already in it together, right now.
We love this hoodie, and couldn’t be more honored to work with Michele on bringing it to life.
McKenzie + Elliott
