This Minneapolis studio showcases pieces from Prince’s sparkling career
February 19, 2025
A large, heart-shaped mirror set against a collage of Prince-related photos and curated art greets guests on the Solar Arts building’s second floor in northeast Minneapolis.
It’s a grand entrance to local artist Michelle Streitz’s Prince Love: Minneapolis Collections exhibit. A celebration of her love and personal work for the Purple One, the studio space is packed with original artifacts collected over several decades. “Showing the legacy of Prince from an art perspective is meaningful and worth seeing,” Streitz says “All of this made Prince. It wasn't just Prince dancing and singing. It was his wardrobe, his props, and how he was photographed.”
The studio houses one of Streitz’s most prized possessions, one of Prince’s glitter canes used during his Lovesexy tour in 1988. When Streitz designed the cane for the tours, she had no idea she’d reunite with it 30 years later.
Prince holds a glitter cane at the start of the “Alphabet St.” music video.
Leading up to her work for Prince, Streitz was an artist and teacher. Growing up in St. Cloud and Sauk Rapids, her first love was pottery. After earning a college degree in arts at St. Kate’s, she got a job at the Minneapolis Institute of Art. During her time at Mia, she learned about Prince’s artistry from coworker Helen Hiatt. (From the mid-’80s to the early ’90s, Hiatt’s role grew from a wardrobe department member on Purple Rain to eventually directing wardrobe design for his tours, music videos, photo shoots, and films.) Streitz was soon entranced.
By 1986, she was teaching art at Northeast Middle School in Minneapolis. One spring, administrator Harvey Winston asked Streitz what she wanted to do the following summer. Streitz’s response: “I want to work for Prince.” Luck would have it that Winston knew Prince’s mother, Mattie Shaw, and put them in touch. When Streitz called Shaw, “I told her I wanted to work for him,” says Streitz. “She said, ‘Oh yes, dear, you can just give him a call’.” But even with encouragement, Streitz wasn’t quite ready yet.
Shortly before Prince launched a world tour in support of his 1988 album, Lovesexy, Streitz got a call from Helen Hiatt. Streitz and artist Tom Briggs were invited to help with props for the tour. “Prince drew from the talented art pool who worked in the museums,” she says. “He knew where to find us.”
Their assignment: Prince wanted glitter canes and mirror hearts with predetermined specifications. Streitz was thrilled.
Before the convenience of online ordering and worldwide accessibility of consumer products, finding something as simple as glitter was an arduous task. “Back then, it was [us] walking down Hennepin Avenue looking for glitter,” Streitz says. “We didn't have any way of finding bins of glitter, so it was whatever we could find and whatever worked. That's what we put in each cane, so they're all different.”
With a lot of experimenting, they found the perfect combination of two different mineral oils and the right proportion of glitter to create movement inside the canes. Prince loved the canes so much that he ordered about 120 of them for the tour. In addition to throwing them out to fans during shows, he gifted them to friends. One created specially for Miles Davis is showcased at his estate in East St. Louis, Illinois.
Besides canes, Streitz and Briggs also created heart- and diamond-shaped jewelry. The laser-cut mirror hearts and diamonds not only embellished Prince’s couture, but bandmates Sheila E., who wore large diamond cuffs, and the late Cat Glover, who rocked the heart-inspired cuffs.
The handmade jewelry and canes showed up in photos and videos from the period, but there was nothing more exciting than seeing her work in action. When Prince kicked off his Lovesexy U.S. tour at Met Center in Bloomington, Streitz was there. “It was really exciting seeing the hearts, canes, and everything on stage,” she says.
Following her Lovesexy experiences, Streitz resumed her teaching career. Like many, Streitz was devastated after Prince’s passing in 2016. It sparked nostalgia for her work with him. When she dug up jewelry she had created for the tour, it birthed the idea for a new venture.
Within her Elle Louise Design and Fine Art Gallery space in northeast Minneapolis, Streitz opened the Prince Love: Minneapolis Collection. It started with a few artifacts, both personal and what she had collected over time, and spurred collaborations with other artists who have showcased exhibitions at her studio.
The studio now houses more than 200 Prince-related artifacts, including original photos taken during Prince shows spanning four decades; replicas of costume pieces, such as the chain hat worn for “My Name is Prince;” a scrap of silk from one of Prince’s Lovesexy costumes; Prince’s Purple Rain glove jewelry; autographed memorabilia; and a glimpse of Morris Day’s high school yearbook from Minneapolis North High. There is even a filled bottle of Prince’s cologne prototype, called Get Wild, in a showcase, alongside an original copy of Prince’s 1989 Batman record.
Of course, one of the orange, glitter-filled canes she made so long ago for Prince also made its way back into her possession and is on display in the studio. In 2018, Streitz caught wind of an auction for a cane. Although she was in Spain at the time, she set an alarm just so she could attend and win back a piece of music history she helped write.
Streitz was so excited that she filmed the moment she opened the cane from its bubble wrap, saying, “I can't believe this is one that I made 30 years ago. It's something that was so important to me, to get it back.”
Streitz collaborates with Prince-inspired artists from around the world, displaying work from photographer Tommy Smith, “Alphabet Street” music video director Patrick Epstein, and graphic designer Jay Vigon, who designed the iconic Purple Rain album lettering.
Some of Prince’s former personal photographers — including Robert Whitman, Allen Beaulieu, Afshin Shahidi, and Jeff Katz — have original photos displayed throughout the studio, and an array of art by designers Doug Henders and Steve Parke embellishes parts of the space.
Replicas of the mirror hearts and diamonds worn by Cat Glover, Prince, and Sheila E. are available for purchase at the studio, and glitter canes are produced upon request.
Streitz also has an Airbnb at her Lowry Hill home that she calls “PrinceLuv Studio” that’s decorated with original artifacts and artwork, where fans can stay amid a little music history.
Every piece Streitz has collected tells a story about Prince. If you ask, she will tell. She believes sharing these artifacts helps shed light on the iconic artist from a different artistic lens. saying, “I'm so glad to carry on his legacy in my own small way here,” she says, “and the legacy of all the other artists who were part of him.”
Prince Love: Minneapolis Collections studio is open on first Thursdays at the Solar Arts Building in Northeast Minneapolis and by appointment.