In a Times Union interview with Elizabeth Mair, Ilyon Woo (who visits the Writers Institute and the Albany Shaker site this Thursday) explains how she became passioniately interested in the Shakers as a young child:
"Well, my parents have been design-obsessed always. My father's an architect, and my mother's a concert pianist. They've always been into visiting these quirky, interesting historical places. Especially ones that feature interesting design. So they started taking me to Shaker villages -- which were really mostly museums -- when I was a very young girl. They would of course look at all these beautiful things that the Shakers made and marvel over all these inventions. But for me -- maybe because I was traveling there with my family -- I couldn't help wondering what it was like to actually live there. That, for me, and not the design, is where the obsession began." More.
