You have to kind of wonder about someone named Judy Tampa. I mean, Tampa's a nice city, but to name yourself after it?
Actually, it turns out to make sense, sort of. Judy Tampa, a born and bred Tampa girl who is now a fashion designer with a line of clothes of the same name, was a musician in San Francisco. She needed a stage name, and as a former art student, she knew about the feminist artist who'd renamed herself Judy Chicago. She thought Judy Tampa would be a jokey takeoff.
"I don't think I would have done it if I'd lived here," she says.
Judy Tampa also seemed to play well as a name for her clothing line, and when she moved back here in 1998, she was already established as Judy Tampa. So that she remains. And she'll just deal with the reaction of "Wha-a-a-t?" when she is introduced here, or "Did your family found Tampa?" when she's elsewhere.
At least her labels bear the name Tampa and not Tampa Bay when they're seen at boutiques around the country on her delightfully quirky - what would you expect from someone named Judy Tampa? - designs.
"They're sophisticated and a little edgy - and a little whimsical," said Deborah Skyrms, who owns Deborah Kent's (hmmm, another name change), the South Tampa boutique where Judy Tampa is having a trunk show this weekend.
On Friday, potential buyers munched on a grape or two and tried to avoid the chocolate chip cookies while they looked through the racks of Judy Tampa designs and talked to the designer herself.
Did she think these black silk cargo pants were long enough, one woman asked, who was trying on things to take on a trip to Israel that required packing super light.
Judy Tampa the woman looks like a pixie, small and thin, with auburn hair in two tiny ponytails. She was wearing her own design from the waist up, with tight, flared jeans so long that they covered part of her nifty red and orange shoes.
Her designs are distinctive. The fabrics she uses are mostly silk and cotton voile, and she tends toward the bright, rich colors you see in Indian saris. Most of them are iridescent. They look as if they've been all crumpled up and wrinkled - but in a nice way. They're sewn, then crinkled afterwards. She has a special way of doing it.
You crinkle them up again after you wash them, so ironing is not only unnecessary but also forbidden, and the clothes are so light, you can pack them in an envelope.
Judy Tampa had no special background in fashion design, but she sewed as a kid and made clothes for herself. In New York, where she lived before California, she bought print silk dresses from the 1940s, cut them up and combined three different floral patterns in one garment. Those sold at the onetime boutique Betsey, Bunky and Nini; the Betsey is Betsey Johnson, who now has her own stores, including one at International Plaza.
Now Judy Tampa starts from scratch. She doesn't have a studio but designs where she lives. She works with a pattern maker and has samples made, which she takes to trade shows in New York several times a year. Store owners place their orders, and the pieces are cut to order and made here in Tampa. They sell for the most part to boutiques that want something almost exclusive. In Tampa, Deborah Kent's is the main place to find Judy Tampa's things, but in North Tampa, Ellay has some pieces. They run from less than $100 to a little more than $300.
You may recognize Judy Tampa from Plant High. She was the girl sent home for wearing her sewing project to class, back in the day when culottes were not allowed at school. She was Hargraves then.
But what's in a name?
Even one that makes people think you're a little weird.
Judy Tampa is philosophical. "Whatever," she says, laughing. "Who cares?"
- Sandra Thompson, a writer living in Tampa, can be reached at tampa@sptimes.com City Life appears on Saturday.
