Talking textiles with St. Frank.
St. Frank founder uses textiles from around the world to mix and mesmerize
Setting eyes on the layers of furniture, fabrics, books, photographs and idiosyncratic objects in the Pacific Heights apartment of Christina Bryant — founder of St. Frank, the well-curated home design store in Presidio Heights that opened in 2015 — feels like taking a trip around the world.
“I don’t like things to match,” Bryant says. “I love different patterns and I love a composition that works without coordination or being perfect. It’s more interesting. Boredom is my biggest fear.”
Vibrant textiles from Senegal and Mali hang on the walls. Glass beads from Ghana are draped across tabletops, and feathered Juju hats from Cameroon hang on the wall in the dining area. There’s a Day of the Dead skull from Mexico on the glass-andbrass bar cart, and a fertility doll from Ghana perches on the bookshelf.
She wrapped the walls of her bedroom with indigo paper she commissioned based on a West African textile pattern. On Bryant’s bed, there’s a pillow covered with a brilliant vintage fragment of a traditional Guatemalan ceremonial garment woven on a backstrap loom. And at the foot of the bed, there’s a fanciful antique Chinese desk. “It was my mother’s,” she says.
Bryant’s collection of furnishings were gathered on personal adventures and business travels for St. Frank. On such trips, boredom isn’t just unlikely — it’s impossible.
“I wanted to create a space that tells my story,” says Bryant, 33, a Stanford alumna who lived in New York and worked at the Museum of Modern Art before deciding to move to rural Rwanda to work for a health care organization in 2007. “I lived in a village and met artisans who made traditional crafts,” she says. “I learned that the crafts are a way for them to tell their
“I lived in a village and met artisans who made traditional crafts. I learned that the crafts are a way for them to tell their stories.” Christina Bryant, St. Frank founder
stories from generation to generation. I wanted to preserve that culture.”
From this desire emerged St. Frank; Bryant partners with artisans on various projects, and the store offers crafts from more than two dozen countries, including Turkey, Vietnam, Bolivia and Panama. “It’s a way to turn craft into sustainable jobs for the artisans,” says Bryant. “For me, it’s about harnessing the power of business to create social change. What I realized in Rwanda is that you can give people fair wages and health care, but what’s really going to change their lives are quality jobs.”
When Bryant isn’t traveling the world discovering new craftwork, she’s hunkered down in her hilltop apartment, taking in the San Francisco landscape. “I’ve got unobstructed views of the bay and the Golden Gate Bridge,” she says. “I work and travel all the time and am a pretty highenergy person, so it’s nice to be able to come home and look out at the water.” Like many before her, she’s drawn to the natural setting and inspired by the spirit of the city. “There’s a culture of innovation in San Francisco that’s amazing for me to draw from as an entrepreneur.”
Piles of brightly colored books are scattered throughout Bryant’s home. There are travel books and fat cookbooks about Mexican and Peruvian cuisine, and well-designed art books on Willem de Kooning and Frida Kahlo. “I’ve got books everywhere,” she says. “I read a lot.”
But her time at home isn’t always quiet. “Even though I live in a studio apartment and I’m not a good cook, I regularly have friends over for dinner parties,” she says. “I can fit six, sometimes more, people around my dining table. If it’s a good night, there’s dancing after whiskey and mezcal, which I always keep on the bar cart.”
But it’s Bryant’s appreciation for authenticity and history — in the form of traditional crafts that tell the stories of the world — that ultimately keeps her guests engaged. “I fell in love with art history as a college student,” she says. “It’s a way to understand people and different perspectives.”
When you purchase crafts from St. Frank, there’s a story that comes with each piece. “Discovering the crafts by hearing their stories is a form of exploration,” she says. “You can share them with people in your home and bring the pieces to life.”