It's theme day and the City Daily Photo theme is feet. This is Texas so I give you some feet in cowboy boots. Now you might think this was at the old ranch house or at least at the Broken Spoke but these 'cowboys' were caught...in a wine bar!
This big red boot announces this boot store on 8th Street. I don't have any boots. I last had a pair back in the eighties. I might like to get some, though. City Daily Photo has a theme day on the first day of the month. June's is 'feet.' Consider this a foreshadowing.
Last night I noticed the giant flags erected on Auditorium Shores, across Lady Bird Lake near the Long Center. I found out that it was the set-up for the Star of Texas Fair and Rodeo Cowboy breakfast. For some reason, to promote this event, they have a tradition of a free 'cowboy breakfast' and entertainment on Auditorium Shores to kick off their even and it was held this morning. I'm not a cowboy or a breakfast person so I just shot the crowd from my balcony. I understand it is 'Dress Western' day in Austin, too, but I don't have hat nor boots. Jeans will have to do. I did see some genuine looking cowboys at the steak house where we had dinner last night, though. I wish I had time to go to the fairgrounds and get some pictures but I'm entirely tied up with the SXSW film festival and other events. There is always lots going on in Austin.
We walked over to the book store on West Sixth yesterday. A large independent book store (surely one of the rare few left) Book People also sells coffee, magazines, cards, incense, toys, gifts, jewelry, chocolate and, as you can see, colorful straw cowboy hats. Maybe someone in town for SXSW next month and surprised by how hot it can get even in March will get their Texas on with these.
From the sign (top of the collage) and the window (bottom with FFP window shopping) you would think this boot shop downtown was an old fixture, there for years. You'd be wrong. It is brand new. I figure they selected the name because they want to reflect the old-time custom bookmakers.
I was at the garden party the other night and encountered Damon Holditch in a straw cowboy hat. (Spring, garden party, you get it.) I had shown him here in a collage of fashion from a party. Well, I didn't get his picture at the garden party but at the dinner before the opera I saw him doing a formal version of his Texas look and looking every bit the part of J.R. on "Dallas" or Jett Rink or Bick Benedict in "Giant." He's with his wife, Becky I believe, and they are talking to, seated, Drs. Michele Berger and David Tobey. Damon has a trademark hat for every occasion. The Drs. are married and great supporters of the arts in Austin. Not everyone in Texas wears a hat (or even owns one) but it's good to keep the legends alive.
I haven't had any cowboy boots in years, but you can certainly get Western Wear in Austin and one spot (Allen's Boots) remains aloof from the SoCo gentrification and sells their wares in a no-nonsense fashion among the trendy art galleries and restaurants and the other hold-out funk like Uncommon Objects and The Continental Club. They don't take much trouble with window displays. Here is a poster for Old Gringos in one.
The very hip-looking guy who is second from left in the collage is Stephen Moser, the fashion editor for the local alternative weekly, The Austin Chronicle which is famous for hosting the SXSW festival. The handsome guy in black is the host of Stephen's 50th birthday, Cliff Redd, Executive director of the Long Center for the Performing Arts. Not unlike other Austin events the party drew a wide array of fashion from Damon Holditch's (of Marquee Event Group) Western regalia to Kate Hersch's (shown with husband Robert) lively headdress. She is holding the one-of-kind pillows she makes that were part of Stephen's birthday take as was the hard-to-get wine Damon is displaying. Austin fashion? Yes, all of it.
I have shown restraint so far in this blog by showing only one reflection picture. But today I'm lazily digging through the archives for a photo. And this reflection of a shop window on South Lamar seemed like a perfect thing to show you. It was taken in March when we were attending the SXSW film festival. One of the venues was the Alamo Draft House on South Lamar and it is in a center with some funky little shops like this one. Yes, you can buy a cowboy hat in Austin, new or used. But you don't really see that many people wearing them unless you go to the Broken Spoke or take a drive out to some smaller towns.