As many of you know, one of my many dreams is to design a Hermes scarf, so this story warms my heart. On the latest issue of Texas Monthly they feature the story of Kermit Oliver, a postman from Waco, Texas, who works the night shift at the local post office and paints during the day. But he also has another job, designing Hermes scarf.

Since 1980, Kermit Oliver has design sixteen scarf. Depending on the image, It can take Oliver about  six months to a year to create one design, then he paints it onto a ninety-by-ninety-centimeter square of watercolor paper, the same size as the scarves, and  then sends it by FedEx to Hermès in Paris.

So you might ask, how did a Oliver end up with such a dream job? You should definitively read the full story here, but New York Magazine offers a quick and easy explanation; “In the seventies, Oliver was represented by the well-respected DuBose Gallery in Houston. He befriended the gallery’s publicist, Shelby Sanders Stroope, wife of Lawrence Marcus, the executive vice-president of Neiman Marcus. When Xavier Guerrand-Hermès, then the president of Hermès’s U.S. operations, told Marcus he was looking for someone to make a Southwest-inspired scarf design, the collaboration was born.”

Currently Kermit Oliver retreated from the art world, but still paints for piece commissioned by art consultants.

Photo from: http://www.texasmonthly.com/multimedia/slideshow/16647