Winsted Resident Brings Hefty Resume

By Colleen Gundlach

When the new manager of the Norfolk Farmers Market, Theresa Cannavo, came to town, she brought along a plate full of experience and immeasurable enthusiasm for food, art and people in general.

Cannavo has been gardening, cooking and eating organically for as long as she can remember. Growing up in West Hartland, her parents had a huge organic garden and were very health conscious in their food preparation. She recalls that she was “the first kid to bring granola bars to school back then.”

This interest in food led the Winsted resident to host a cooking show on local cable television Channel 13, and to doing cooking demonstrations for the Rose Nader Circle’s Health Food Week and for the Friends of Main Street’s Bubbles and Truffles fundraiser. However, her talents reached well beyond Northwestern Connecticut when she entered, and won, the Food Network’s Chef’s Challenge Baking Competition. Cannavo took home the $10,000 first prize for her four different kinds of cookies, all baked on national television.

Her interests don’t stop at cooking. The Studios at Whiting Mills complex in Winsted is where Cannavo spends the lion’s share of her time. She is a self-taught craftsperson, and her studio presents an eclectic array of her métiers, from recycled market bags to custom slipcovers to rebuilt and reupholstered antique furniture.

Cannavo honed her upholstery skills at an early age, being mentored by her father and some other “great craftsmen who taught me how to handle antique, heirloom pieces with care.” Her father was a cabinet maker who had a shop across the street from what is now Whiting Mills, in another part of the former factory, so it was fortuitous that Cannavo ended up working there. “The very smell of the old factory building brings back wonderful memories,” she says.

At her studio she also teaches upholstery and sewing, in lessons of two to three hours each. “These lessons are often therapy for some people,” she says. “I send people home feeling happy and exhausted, and often with blisters.”

Cannavo’s involvement as a former member of the Winsted Economic Development Commission and past chairperson of Winsted’s Redevelopment Commission garnered experience that led her to the Norfolk’s Farmers Market. “I plan to observe and understand the workings of the market right now,” she says. “I would like to find out what the committee wants and then implement that.”

She was impressed, she says, by the cohesiveness, friendliness and respectfulness of the members of the Farmers Market Committee. “They know each other’s strengths and assign tasks based on talents. It is not politically based, and I like that.”

Photos by Bruce Frisch.