ERICA WILSON Wife of Designer Vladimir Kagan, Basket of Flowers Needlepoint Embroidery. Framed. Provenance: Estate Liquidation Auction of Valdimir Kagan, S&S Auction Repaupo NJ 2023.

size: 16.25 x 16.25 matte, 26 x 26 outside frame, Google: Erica WilsonThe Park Avenue apartment where Mr. Kagan lived with his wife, Erica Wilson — a needlepoint queen whose public-television show presaged the Martha Stewart era of do-it-yourself home improvement. To millions of needle workers, Erica Wilson is America's First Lady of stitchery. A graduate of the Royal School of Needlework in London, Erica was invited to teach in the United States in 1954. News of her classes spread and she was soon teaching groups all over America in classes, lectures and seminars. When students couldn't remember all the stitches she taught them, Erica wrote her first book "Crewel Point" published in 1962 by Charles Scribner's Sons, which subsequently sold over one million copies! She wrote sixteen other books and produced and starred in two television series for WGBH seen on PBS nationally and the BBC in England and Australia.Her television series and books brought her fame on both sides of the Atlantic. She opened her first store in Nantucket, which remains a "must visit" attraction for the past 45 years. She became the exclusive designer for a national kit manufacturer, designed sheets, fabrics and wallpaper, wrote a bi-weekly syndicated column and became the spokesperson for a national organization teaching needlework. She produced four videos on needlepoint, quilting, knitting and cross stitch. Erica designed and manufactured exclusive needlepoint kits for the Metropolitan Museum of Art as well as her own wholesale collection available through fine Needlework shops