A visit with ChaCha

Charlotte Karp with roses and a Peggi Kroll Roberts butter painting.

FIRST PERSON | THOMAS REYNOLDS

ONE OF THE greatest pleasures of owning a gallery for all these years is meeting so many wonderful people. For the most part, the people moved to walk into an art gallery are a kind and interesting lot. Some are special. And that includes Charlotte Karp, a very fine watercolorist and collector.

Charlotte was an early encourager of my gallery in San Francisco. She lived in the neighborhood, and frequently stopped by after lunch on Fillmore Street with her friend Swan Brown, a Florida expat like me, and also an art enthusiast. They both became close friends — “like family, without the baggage,” as another neighbor and great friend said. We often had lunch, and celebrated many birthdays together.

On a recent return to our longtime neighborhood — my first since the pandemic and a move to Santa Barbara — I wrote to Charlotte to ask if I could come by for tea. Her ebullience is now reduced to a whisper, but she welcomed a visit. Her flat’s a short walk away, and I stopped as I passed Bloomers, everybody’s favorite florist, to get flowers. The shop was still closed to the public, but a sign in the window gave the email and phone number. So I called, and owner Patric Powell answered. I asked if I might get a handful of something nice to take to a friend up the street. “Just give me a minute,” he said. Soon he opened the door with an armful of beautiful pink roses and asked, “Will these do?” They certainly would. I handed him my credit card, but he refused it. “Welcome home,” he said.

MORE: “In Charlotte’s web“