Gaby Basora - Tucker

Mother Stories

Tucker’s Gaby Basora On Living An Inspired Family Life

Written by Katie Hintz-Zambrano

Photography by Photographed by Heather Moore

Jan 4, 2017

Ready to start thinking outside the box? Let Gaby Basora be your guide. The founder of print-tastic label Tucker and mother of a 16-year-old, 14-year-old, and 8-year-old (all boys!), Basora is a true original who lives life with big, wide eyes, soaking it all up. In addition to showing us around her artfully curated Upper West Side home, she inadvertently gives us all a lesson on living with great joy, intellect, and finding gratitude in the little things (for example, she lists one of her favorite artworks as a pink Post-it, scrawled with curly-Q’s by her youngest son, and watching a scoop of vanilla ice cream drop into a cup of espresso as a life-advice moment). Of course, this type of inspiration gathering is natural for a lady who has created inventive print after print after print for the past 10 years. Get a peek into her poetic life (and watch her do a whopping eight costume changes!), below. Then figure out how you can somehow order one of whatever she’s having.

: "I moved crosstown this fall. It is uptown, at the foot of Central Park, and near many museums. The realtor from Halstead described the living room as gracious. Indeed, with details that remind me of the houses with lots of charm in Seattle, where I grew up, and solid, made-to-last grandeur of a Parisian apartment. There are double-glassed gated doors and stained glass windows in the stairwells."

: "Cozy, simple, uncluttered, and meant to be enjoyed. Texture, color, and a mix of prints. Is there a word to describe the imprint hurried starts to school days and workdays leaves? Pretty paint stains on the dining room table?"

: "Generosity. The apartment is a repository for friendship and family. Photographer Sue Kwon gave me a book on Marella Agnelli. The book shows rooms of pink-and-white stripe wallpaper. It was a big compliment to be compared. Marella describes bringing pieces of fabric to throw over furniture. I have a very soft bed sheet brought from Ethiopia by my friend Yodit. My kids say, 'Mommy you always make the softest beds!'"

: Gaby's youngest, putting on some tunes.

: Gang's all here! Gaby wears a Tucker tie blouse and Maje jeans. Her boys (left to right) wear Petit Bateau pajamas and Hades suits.

: Afternoon snack.

: "A beautiful portrait by Arthur H. Gorson of Bob Marley that my mom gave me. It belonged to my uncle, he loved reggae, and us—his nieces—enough to even bring us on a date with a pretty girl to see Bob Marley in the late seventies. I was no more than six or seven. In the kitchen it reminds me of sanctity, of life and character. Also, a bronze statue by artist Charles Masse, brought from France from family friends—any work by an artist that titles pieces 'Conversations From The Window' is my kind of stuff. A painting by Sean Vegezzi. A series by Robert Cipriano, from the young curators program at MoMA. A few photographs of the kids. A portrait of Jack and I shot by Pamela Hanson. The two boys in a shoot for Cookie Magazine looking like they were on their way to Woodstock. A pink Post-it with 'I love you mom' written with curly Q's on the M's. In the spirit of the book Notes On My Dunce Cap, by Jesse Ball, beautiful materials. Paintbrushes from the hardware store are in a jar in the kitchen. They came wrapped in tissue with rubber bands placed precisely like pistachios in a chocolate bar."

: The aforementioned pink Post-it.

: "The place belongs to all of us. The table gets taken over by crayons and paper and paint when a project is under way. And then gets put away and dinner is served. It’s like the edge of the ocean in the house...daily mess...clean mess clean..."

: Gaby wears a vintage sweatshirt and Tucker pants. Her son wears a Gap top and Levi's jeans.

: "It is relatively uncluttered compared to spaces in the past. When the older ones were young, there were more balls and drums. More of everything came home, with two boys twenty months apart. Most of the stuff here now is more than 'stuff' because it means something."

: "A scarf turned into curtains from a tiny shop at the top of the hill in Montmartre. The littlest one started to walk in Paris on rainy streets in his first soft blue Pom D' Api boots and that scarf made of gauzy cotton with rainbow colored stitching is a good souvenir from this time. Drawings he made into mobiles with safety pins joining the pieces together. They are gorgeous. A watercolor in pink of the letter H, his initial, and other great things...hamburgers, hot chocolate. Music equipment, the speakers and amp in the big boys' room. Equipment and machinery are beautiful and I love to hear the music the boys are making together. A cookie tin from a bakery in Barcelona. The memory of that sticks with me, something so simple can be delivered so exquisitely, each wrapped with much care by a woman in a white lab coat. Dominoes and dice from Linda Horn, a shop nearby that we love to visit for the animal statues and porcelains and to visit Sid, the gregarious shop spaniel. The dominoes can be a card game and all sorts of other made-up games."

: "I am optimistic. I am a designer."
Gaby wears a vintage top and Tucker skirt.

: Desktop treasures.

: "I made things for myself and other people liked them and wanted to buy them."

: "Stories, shadows, colors, wrappers, characters..."

: "I grew up in Seattle. I went to Sarah Lawrence College. I am currently getting my MBA at the Institut Francais de la Mode in Paris, which I expect to finish this year. I had a handful of jobs before I got into styling, which was my job before starting Tucker. I worked at Agnes b. I cocktail waitressed. I worked shortly at Woody Allen's production company."

: "I have become very reliable."

: Moms make the best pillows.

: And so do dogs...

: "Yes, I am sure. I didn't want to take jobs when I was styling that took me away from them. Thank you kids. I stayed on more commercial jobs. I wasn't feeling I was reaching my potential like I wanted to."

: "It is a real challenge to juggle work and motherhood. The maternity leave is a good example of where things could be improved in society. Here’s where the village is good. I took six months off with my first baby and I worked only as favors to friends, when I could bring Jack. For the second, I took six weeks off. I went back to styling jobs with my baby in the carriage bassinet, breastfeeding on Winnebagos. Crawling babies napped in carriages covered with costumes to fake a dark room. I started Tucker before the third was born and came back to the studio after a month. I had a crib by my desk and a young woman named Fabiola, which she was. She helped entertain the baby. Her sister then helped and later started working at Tucker when he started school. The Tucker family. Kids in the studio, that hasn't changed."

: The fourth "child."

: "I have been freelance and independently employed always as a mother. I have had my own business. There have been times the financial insecurity of that type of work has enormous stress, but it also gifted me with flexibility that has been very sweet. I could be there for things with the kids, be close to them, decide when to travel for work mostly, and brought children to work. I feel lucky for that. Plus, their lives have been made richer by the girls who were working for Tucker, whose lives, friends, and family we all came to know."

: "I do. I do! I have women I appreciate very much. I adore them. I enjoy them. Our struggles are all personal, but their affection helps keep the chin up. That's an understatement. I couldn't make it through without a couple other women, in Paris, in Stockholm, and California. We support each other over the phone, with texts, FaceTime, and emails. The feeling that there are folks rooting for you and you are rooting for them, it's necessary."

: "The making of the clothes, the fabrics, the people, the experiences. Shopping for buttons in midtown and being invited to speak with you for your site, seeing Monica from Sea featured when we knew each other from styling days, meeting your photographer, Heather. People that come through the office. Their stories. The husbands of coworkers, the sisters, brothers, or lovers."
Gaby wears a Tucker butterfly-print dress.

: Another shelfie.

: Stacked.

: "Tucker had an organic start, a natural momentum that often feels like wind in the sails. So, it can feel like a child with potential and us the partners, the parents, set with the task of seeing where we can take things. At the moment the grand task is a simple one, to build a business. I have partnered with talented partners. Tucker is rightly well appreciated and adored. We will see what comes next!"

: "I always wanted to be a mother. The folding of their clothes and even the ironing of their clothes. I am still eager to do it after sixteen years. That is the daily upkeep. The magnitude of knowing them as I have known my parents and they know me, that is almost incomprehensible. I enjoy them. I am thrilled to be around them. Many days I am tired and/or they are and then it's a moment to push through with as little drama as possible. I fail sometimes."
Gaby swears a Tucker blouse and Maje jeans.

: "I have always worked. That causes anxiety to want to be there for them always and the responsibility to my vocation, as well. I have two vocations. And underlying it all is vulnerability and fragility."

: "My mom for her dedication. Her selflessness is evident. She is also a reminder of the many facets a woman's life has and what a woman can hope to have and achieve. I don't like to focus on only moms. Good life advice and examples come from everywhere. From the author of Reading Lolita in Tehran. A scoop of vanilla ice cream in an espresso in the afternoon. Some of the greatest moments can be a walk to the newsstand for Pokémon cards. I don’t even think the real rules are understood."

: "I like real-life stories, memoirs, articles, movies, not about parenting, but about life. Also, Natalia Ginzburg's book, The Little Virtues."

: "I didn't care at all if they were boys or girls. It's fun being with the boys. I have always known camaraderie. My dad is one of four boys, my grandma is super feminine amidst her boys, she was still chasing my boys, her great grandsons, around her patio in heels with the garden hose at 95. In my mother's family, there were three brothers and I was very close to all my uncles on both sides. They took us to concerts and to hang out. Personally, I have three sisters! Growing up, we were the girls, indeed, but in a gang sort of way. The Canaries, they called us, in yellow footed PJ's. We grew up in Seattle in backyards, in the city, in nature. Jumping off the rope swings and owning your first pair of Guess jeans were equal rites of passage. Maybe some would find it strange, but we are all human, after all. Boos-boos and bedtimes, break-ups, and boys and girls."

: "I guess it is impossible not to make mistakes, even with all the efforts. I have very loving parents, that is for certain. They are wonderful at giving good advice even when it is hypocritical to what they might have done. I try to take the good advice."

: "The older ones: The city, their friends, music, concerts, staying out late. I am the lady in the Tucker silk robe feeling as ragged as Gena Rowlands in A Woman Under The Influence, receiving texts to tell me where they are and then waiting to answer the door so I know they are home. Just when everyone started to sleep through the night...the newborns are back! The youngest loves animals, playing records, music, drawing, friends, playing, and serial comedies, which is payback for making my dad watch Three's Company, which my sisters and I thought was a hilarious show. It was best enjoyed with a contraband bowl of Captain Crunch."

: "Lucky you."

: "It is indefinable, I hope. Backwards many things...blouses, dresses, silk robes. Layers of clothing, a button-up shirt, men's-style trousers, a pantsuit, or a bodysuit and a pleated silk skirt. A pantsuit, a bodysuit, and a birthday suit."
Gaby wears a Tucker robe.

: "Not much."

: "Odd jeans, mom jeans, high-waisted jeans, star-bottomed jeans. Child's-size sweaters and sweatshirts are as much staples as stockings and skirts and blouses are. Heels, hats, necklaces, chains with pendants, and hoops."

: Tea time.

: "I wear at least one piece of Tucker pretty much every day, if not a full look. I wear vintage, Pollini shoes, a Bally bag, Topshop jeans, Levi's, Urban Outfitters leotards, Wolford stockings, an Alyssa Norton necklace, Cerise Sur Le Chapeau fedora, other hats from Seigo on Madison Avenue, Artepasti socks, Lulu Frost earrings, a Solange Azagury Partridge lip ring. Manon hoops, Amelie Prichard vegan bags and shoes. I don't wear Berluti, but I enjoy the brand for its motto: Audacity and virtuosity."

: "Not structured, not fancy always. Dollar store red lipstick. By Terry under eyes. Alexandra Soveral makes products that deserve mention—praise her Angel Balm Mask and her face oil. Clarins Eau des Jardins eau de toilette—the boys like it, too. Good smells, good vibes. Good vibes, good looks."

: Gaby wears Tucker overalls and a vintage jacket.

: "In person I like best. The walk to the shop, the lunch with the boys, the welcome at Agent Provocateur. Le fun major at Le Marche Noir in Paris. Off price stores in midtown for old Levi's jeans and jean jackets. A shop catering to a mature clientele for shoes. Since I don't have delicate feet, these feet are machines and a white comfortable pump to ride a bike in or walk for miles in is appreciable."

: "As much as ever, pantsuits—by Tucker for me and for the boys, Hades suits, a new French brand that is unisex!"

: "I love athleticism. Human strength and beauty. I like meditative running...in a turtleneck and stockings. I was running daily, or riding my bike with the vitesse of a bike messenger to and from the office. I would love to go daily to a dance class. My goal: Limber, lithe, agile, nimble. But it can be hard to have the time in the day right now with the relaunch. Work and the kids require a lot and just stretching in bed, walking the dog, taking the train and the stairs is good."

: "New York City of Brighton Beach and Coney Island bumper cars, of the Uptown, Downtown, Harlem, Brooklyn, Astoria. Of cultures and conversations in the newspaper shop and taxis and street performers on corners and in the subway train. And still turtles in Central Park and Morningside Park. And bluejays and falcons, and trees to climb and fishing by Fairway. Maira Kalman at The Jewish Museum. A city with double dutch competitions at the Apollo Theater. And street ball games and grandpas in the playground to help you shout 'pedal! pedal! pedal!' to a kid learning to ride his bike! And then days later, a boy on the back rack of a bike playing 'La Vie En Rose' on a hand-turned music box. We did it here."
Gaby wears a Tucker jacket and Maje jeans.