SHANNON MAHER
Dean, Jay and Patty Baker School of Business and Technology
“The bulletin board by my desk is full of memories, meaningful objects, things I find attractive, and colors that I like. Every now and then I’ll add something to it, but I rarely take anything away.”
1 SUPIMA AD
“When you go back far enough in American history, you see that we did not just advertise products, we advertised fibers, like in this Supima ad from the 1940s. They’re always so elegantly done—they’re timeless.”
2 CLOTHING LABELS
“Ingrid Johnson was the acting chair of Home Products Development, and when I was going through her files after she retired, I came across these wonderful clothing labels from the Garment District. It was basically a sales tool to show what the company could produce. They are all images of well-known artworks. I have an appreciation for craft and old things.”
3 COLOR PALETTE
“I found this vintage color palette in the files of FIT. At that time, we were trying to find a color for the Home Products Development program (we ultimately went with PMS 7467U). I thought this was a really nice palette, and it matches the pictures around it.”
4 WOVEN PORTRAIT
“This was from a trip to India. We had to wake up at three in the morning to get on a flight, then take a connecting flight to the south of India, where all the big sheeting mills are. As soon as we got out of the car, they put leis around our necks and snapped pictures of us. You can imagine how we looked after six hours of travel. After we finished our day, they gave me this picture of me, woven on their sampling machine. We now have one of those machines on campus.”
5 THANK-YOU CARD
“This is hand embroidery on a card. I think it’s a brilliant idea, very FIT.”
6 STUFFED ANIMAL
“In the industry, I dealt a lot with filled products. This stuff ed animal is from a company that does filled product with alpaca. During spring break one year, I went upstate to go see the alpaca farms. They’re just funky, unique animals.”
7 GROUP PHOTO
“This is from the 2015 Home Products graduating student breakfast, with my first graduating class. It was a really special group.”
8 “LUXURY LUNCH”
“This was taken on a design and product development trip to India, when I was working at The Company Store [a bedding and bath textiles company now owned by Home Depot], probably in 2013. My travel partner, Melanie Kaplan, the CCO of the company, is using our hand sanitizer wipes before we eat canned tuna salad we brought with us at an unfinished table that could have given us splinters. Everybody thinks travel is glamorous, but this was our ‘luxury lunch.’”
Shannon Maher is the dean for the Jay and Patty Baker School of Business and Technology, overseeing the school’s 10 associate’s and baccalaureate programs. Maher served as a faculty member and chair of the school’s Home Products Development Department from 2013–20.