Bayou Artist | Dorothy Williams

article by Starla Gatson
photography by Kelly Moore Clark

Dorothy Williams isn’t a big fan of sticking to a set pattern when she sews. She prefers to be original and to do things her way so her personality shines through in the end. Williams lives her life this way, too. The fiber artist is one-of-a-kind, choosing to do things that make her happy rather than sticking to the status quo. That’s why, at 92 years old, she’s still creating. She says it brings her joy, and as long as she can make that joy for herself, she will. After all, she adds, “Life is too short to be unhappy.” 

Though Williams first became acquainted with sewing at age four and a half — “My mother was very busy, so she let me sew on her electric sewing machine before I started at school,” she recalls — she doesn’t remember getting serious about making garments until she was a pre-teen. “I have a sister who’s 20 months older than I am, and we shared clothes,” she says. “Boys started teasing me because I had on her clothes. So, my mother said she’d find money to buy fabric if I would make my own.” 

By the time Williams — she was still a Seegers then — was in high school, her family had moved from the southern half of the state to Columbia. She graduated from the Caldwell Parish town’s high school and made her way to Louisiana Tech University, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts in Clothing and a Bachelor of Science in Education. 

Post-college, Williams, now married, was teaching home economics in Junction City. Then, she learned she was pregnant with her first child. She left the classroom to be home with her son. Besides, she says, her husband had been drafted, and the family had to move to San Antonio. 

The Williamses didn’t stay in Texas forever, though. When the family patriarch’s military service ended, they moved to El Dorado, Arkansas. He accepted a job with Arkansas Power and Light, now Entergy, and Williams resumed life as a stay-at-home mom. Now, however, she’d be raising two, as she and her husband welcomed their second son. Having her children gave Williams more motivation to sew, and when she wasn’t making matching outfits for her boys, she was making Barbie doll clothes for her friends’ daughters. 

When her boys were old enough to go to school, Williams decided she would go back, too. She enrolled at the University of Louisiana Monroe, took elementary education courses, and got back into the classroom. This marked the beginning of her tenure as a fifth- and sixth-grade teacher, a position she held for 26 years until she had to retire in 1986. 

“I had pericarditis and supraventricular tachycardia, and they wouldn’t let me go back in the classroom,” Williams shares. “They said I couldn’t get tired, be around germs, or be under stress. I said, ‘How am I going to teach school?’ And they said, ‘You aren’t.” And that was that.” 

Not long after Williams retired, her husband did, too — “He couldn’t stand that I was home and he wasn’t,” she jokes — and the two decided to move their lives to Milton, Florida. That was where her brother-in-law lived, and she reasoned that the two brothers ought to be able to spend more time together. The pair called Florida home for 14 years.

All the while, Williams continued creating, having picked up knitting and quilting at this point. In Florida, she found community centered around fiber art, going to small groups in Pensacola and Milton. Eventually, her connections in those groups led to opportunities for her to teach quilting. She became a Sunshine State circuit teacher, leading classes all along the Florida panhandle. Her teaching credits also include classes at three national quilting conventions, at the American Sewing Guild in Dallas and D.C., and the Houston Quilt Show. 

As she taught, Williams continued creating wearable art of her own, including a garment inspired by Pablo Picasso. 

“We went to Atlanta to a Picasso exhibit,” Williams recalls, “and I didn’t have any better sense to say if Picasso could paint it, I could put it on fabric, which I did. I have a garment that is his painting ‘Girl Before a Mirror,’ and it is my favorite thing.” 

Williams modeled the Picasso garment in a style show in Pacific Grove, California. Her teaching peers there were so impressed with her work that they encouraged her to pursue being in the Bernina Fashion Show. Designing something for the show is a prestigious honor, one of the highest a wearable art creator can receive, and participation is by invitation only. In 2002, Williams received her invitation. 

“That’s when I made my Dupioni silk garment with over 150 handmade silk flowers on it,” she recalls.

That garment, called Voice of the Flowers, was professionally modeled and traveled internationally for a year. It and the ‘Girl Before a Mirror’ piece are just two of Williams’ noteworthy creations. A few others include a baseball-themed suit she made for a Paducah Quilt Show wearable art competition and a skirt and jacket set with bright dinosaur appliques and a stuffed dinosaur on the shoulder. 

Williams says she’s made around 50 garments, and while some of them she wears, others are for sale — “At 92, I’m trying not to leave all this for somebody to have to deal with,” she quips as she recalls her large collection of handmade items. She doesn’t make them much anymore. Nowadays, her focus is primarily on quilting, which she does independently and with friends — she meets up with two of them to quilt every Saturday. She gives away most of what she makes. Making such large pieces in her small apartment takes a lot of patience and innovation, she says, but the work is worth it. 

“I enjoy making them,” she declares before adding, “As long as God will let me, I’m going to quilt.”

She says her quilts are like her children, and each one has a name and a story. 

“I write up the story of every quilt, and a friend types it on her computer,” she says. “You can print on the fabric. So, when I write them, she’ll print them, and I sew them so people will forever know the quilt’s story. That’s just another thing I do. I just can’t stand not adding my part, something of me and everything I do.”

When Williams isn’t quilting, she remains as active as possible, noting proudly, “I’m the oldest one [at my assisted living community] that doesn’t use a cane, walker, or wheelchair. I take pride in being healthy, and I tell people I am blessed.” 

Her days consist of spending time with her older brother and sister, who also call Monroe home, working jigsaw puzzles, attending a book club, and serving with the P.E.O. women’s philanthropy organization and her church’s hospitality committee. These things, plus creating fiber art, make her happy and give her satisfaction. And that’s the advice she offers aspiring fiber artists: do the things that satisfy their souls.

“Not everybody is going to get recognition,” Williams says. “But if, deep within, they’re satisfied and happy with what they’ve done, I think they are accomplishing their goal.” 

Williams’s story is also a reminder to trust the process, knowing that, just because they don’t come soon doesn’t mean recognition and accolades won’t come at all. Her recognition for her sewing talents didn’t arrive until she had retired from a decades-long teaching career, and now, even at 92, she believes there’s still more to come.

“When I was asked to be a Bernina designer, I thought that was probably the highest honor I could get as a fiber artist,” she muses. “But to be honest, after being interviewed on LPB, having my [retrospective at the Northeast Louisiana Arts Council], and being in BayouLife, I think my life isn’t over.”