Around 1923 or perhaps a little earlier, one of the Yup’ik inhabitants of remote St. Lawrence Island in the Bering Sea decided to sell this fine ceremonial parka to Arnold Liebes, a furrier from a prominent California family. The Liebes owned a string of Arctic trading posts, as well as an elegant department store near Union Square in San Francisco: Arnold Liebes knew all about high-end fashion and style. So on one of his trips to northern Alaska, he purchased this classic Yup’ik parka fashioned from bleached walrus intestine and ornamented with plumes and orange beak parts from crested auklets. Read more at Hakai magazine.
Photo courtesy Hiart and Wikimedia commons.
Heather Pringle 