From Chester to Hollywood to Columbia Falls — the multiple talents of Jean Flynn

Jean Flynn grew up on a farm outside of Chester near the Sweet Grass Hills, with five brothers. She learned to cook and bake from her mother and even at a young age had an artistic eye — decorating her room as she saw fit.

But farm life was not for her, at least not in her youth, so when she graduated from high school she moved to Seattle. By the time she was 27 she owned her own restaurant, a place that was so impeccably designed and decorated that people said she should work in Hollywood, doing movie sets.

So she did. Work in Hollywood, that is.

Over the years she worked a variety of films as a designer, including a couch for the film “Get Shorty” that would fit famously short actor Danny DeVito.

She also worked on the Muppets TV show and her last film was A Bug’s Life.

All told, she figures she worked on 17 different films and she was part of a design team that won a prime time Emmy.

But then about 14 years ago she decided to move back to Montana after 32 years on the West Coast.

“I get this voice in my head that I’m going to open a pie shop,” she said.

So there she is, back to her proverbial culinary roots, baking pies for the good folks of Columbia Falls, selling them at Farmer’s Markets and other venues.

“Pies are a way to spread joy and love,” she said. “You can’t say pie with a frown on your face.”

She also picks up interior design work, specializing in Bespoke projects where she not only hand-picks the materials, but painstakingly hand sews it as well.

“The work I do is a dying art,” she said.

Take the coat she’s wearing on this cold winter day. It’s hand sewn from a wool blanket. Things got busy enough that she opened her own studio last summer on Sixth Street West in the old union hall across from city hall.

If you happen to drive by in the evenings, you might even see her inside, working on a project.

The cozy studio features local and national artists and work of her own. One-hundred percent of the proceeds go back to the artist, she noted.

But she’s not stopping with pies and interior design.

During the interview the phone rang with good news — she had been approved to close down the street on Sunday mornings in front of the hall.

She has plans for Farmers Market this summer, featuring as many farmers and craftspeople as she can get. But no booze. No food trucks.

Flynn is a self-described “thrifter.”

“A lot of stuff in my life came out of Dumpsters,” she laughs. But with her touch, it transforms to functional art.

Take the stocking hats made out of secondhand sweaters. They fit your head like a glove, warm too.

“We need warm and fuzzy now more than ever,” she said.