Designing Playmate 

a fabric fancier has the material to become miss august 

Why do studio audiences erupt into applause when TV personalities announce the fact that they hail from Brooklyn? We've often wondered, but now we're beginning to understand. Treats, if not trees, grow in Brooklyn -- Elaine Paul being one such. Elaine works in that bustling borough as a journeyman (well, journeywoman) fabric designer, journeying blithely from Greenpoint to Gowanus in whatever form of loco locomotion she happens to find handy. Those who know about such things say she has a way with perky patterns, and we -- who know about certain other things -- say that she herself is woven with a warp and woof wondrous enough to make her a memorable Miss August. 
Photography by MarFrank Eck