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Our Becky's Creations Gain Stamp of Approval
For Bethlehem Pastry Chef, A Tasty Stamp of Approval By Amy Mulvihill BETHLEHEM -- Bethlehem has long prided itself on its designation as "the Christmas town," and has gone to great lengths to ensure that when holiday revelers think about Christmas, they also think Bethlehem, Conn. With its "Follow the Star to Bethlehem" slogan, the town holds a Christmas festival on the town green on the first weekend in December every year, and during the months and weeks leading up to Christmas, the town's post office is inundated with mail from senders eager to have their seasonal greetings branded with the town's holiday postmark. Later this year, holiday enthusiasts can go one better, because on top of visiting the town for the Christmas festival and getting their cards and letters marked with the Bethlehem seal, they can also request a booklet of the U.S. Postal Service's 2005 Commemorative Christmas Issue "Holiday Cookies," stamps which feature photos of cookies designed and baked by Bethlehem resident and local pastry chef Rebecca Shea Vermilyea. Along with Washington artist Tommy Simpson and Emily Diffrient-Crumpton of Austin, Tex., Ms. Vermilyea's cookie designs were photographed by New Milford photographer and frequent U.S. Postal Service collaborator Sally Anderson Bruce and submitted to the Postal Service. The group of four images chosen, which feature snowmen designed by Ms. Vermilyea and Mr. Simpson, gingerbread men designed by Ms. Diffrient-Crumpton, a Santa Claus designed by Mr. Simpson, and an angel and stars and Christmas trees designed by Ms. Vermilyea, will be available nationwide beginning at the end of October. Ms. Vermilyea was first approached about the project more than two years ago, but was sworn to secrecy about it until the final decision was announced earlier this month. The news was exciting, she said this week, particularly because of the local connections. "I didn't realize it, but I guess it really is a big to-do," Ms. Vermilyea commented. "It's nice that it's not coming from some big design house in New York or Chicago." Furthermore, Ms. Vermilyea said the project was a lot of fun for her personally because of all the ways in which it so perfectly tied up all the disparate strands of her life. Born in Waterbury and raised in Bethlehem, Ms. Vermilyea, 33, went through the Region 14 school system before going off to the University of Connecticut in Storrs to study graphic design. While growing up, Ms. Vermilyea's mother, Marilynn Shea, also happened to work in the town's post office. "Growing up in Bethlehem, which is the Christmas Town, and my mom working in the Post Office for so many years, it just all sort of falls into place," she said with a laugh. After graduating in 1993 with a fine arts degree, Ms. Vermilyea moved home and began looking for a temporary job to replenish her bank account. She landed a position as a hostess at Carole Peck's Good News Cafe in Woodbury, but was drafted into the kitchen when the restaurant's pastry chef fell ill. A lifelong cook with a special interest in baking, Ms. Vermilyea took to the position like a fish to water. She left the Good News Cafe briefly to go to the Exhibition Cafe at the Mattatuck Museum in Waterbury, but returned to take up permanent residence in the restaurant's kitchen shortly thereafter. Ten years later, Ms. Vermilyea is still at Carole Peck's acclaimed restaurant, whipping up the famed desserts which have been honored as the best in the state by readers of Connecticut magazine for several years running. It was through her connections at the restaurant that Ms. Vermilyea was tapped for the task of creating the cookies that would be featured on the stamps. "Sally is a client, she comes into the restaurant for dinner a lot, and I guess she was doing this project and wasn't happy with the work this other person had done," she explained. "I guess she mentioned something to Carole and Carole said, 'Why don't you try Rebecca?'" One morning shortly thereafter, Ms. Anderson Bruce came in, asked Ms. Vermilyea to participate, and had her sign a confidentiality agreement preventing her from speaking publicly about the project until the Postal Service had made its decision. Ms. Vermilyea said that Ms. Anderson Bruce informed her that she was planning to photograph the cookies against a blue background, and began planning her designs accordingly. For instance, Ms. Vermilyea insisted on sketching her designs beforehand, planning out the cookies' designs, textures and colors, noting, "That's how I work anyway." "I was just given the cookie-cutters, and Sally had discussed with me that she wanted to get away from the typical Christmas colors, so I used traditional Christmas colors but altered them just a few shades in either direction," she said, adding that she also, "tried to repeat colors and patterns" to ensure the cookies functioned as a cohesive unit. Although the process was time consuming and exacting, Ms. Vermilyea said it was not unusual for her. "If I'm making a dessert, I think about how it will look on the plate, about its different textures, colors and temperatures," she explained. "It's what I learned at UConn when I got my graphic design degree." "For this particular project," she continued, "it really helped that I was a pastry chef with a graphic design background ... it added some elements to the presentation." |
