PrintRocki Gorman's Western Experience
EnlargeWestern jewelry designer Rocki Gorman has gone from native-Jersey girl to classic Harvey girl with her recent move into Santa Fe’s historic hotel La Fonda on the Plaza. For more than 40 years, La Fonda was one of the Harvey Houses under the auspices of legendary hotelier Fred Harvey. While many know him best for the famed “Harvey Girls”‚ — the hotel waitresses immortalized by Judy Garland in a classic MGM musical‚ — Harvey also had a role in the development of the contemporary Native American jewelry market.
“He saw the need to sell jewelry with meaning and guided the Navajos into making jewelry with symbols‚ — crossed arrows for friendship, thunderbirds for prosperity, and so on,” Gorman explains. “He was an amazing businessman and a great marketer.” While La Fonda is no longer a Harvey property, it remains one of Santa Fe’s most prestigious addresses, with a long history that dates back to the opening of the Santa Fe Trail. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant attended a ball there after winning the Civil War, and it is rumored that Billy the Kid once worked at La Fonda as a dishwasher. Today, the hotel is renowned for its museum-quality Southwestern art, including copperplate photogravures by Edward S. Curtis and murals by Paul Lantz.
Gorman is excited about bringing her own Southwestern masterpieces to La Fonda, many of them inspired by her new location. “Just walk through the lobby and you step back into a time and place of history that cannot be seen anywhere but Santa Fe,” she explains. “The visual experience, the sounds and smells that surround me, will only heighten my creativity. This is a dream come true.”
FYI: Designs by Rocki Gorman, La Fonda on the Plaza, 100 E. San Francisco St., Santa Fe, New Mexico, 505.983.7833, www.rockigorman.com.
Issue: July 2010
