Showing posts with label renegade handmade. Show all posts
Showing posts with label renegade handmade. Show all posts

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Holiday Show Recap: Part 2

So we loaded up the wagon last Friday and headed to the windy city for my very first Renegade Craft Fair. We stayed right downtown (at kitschy/cheap wonderland: the Ohio House) After immediately hitting the Michigan Ave. H&M (we forgot to bring hats, gloves, scarves etc) we were adequately warm and ready to hang out.



(looks cold, huh?)

My sister Lisa and her husband Brad came to town too, so we all went out on Friday and had some deep dish and beers-- we didn't Yelp it up before hand and ended up at the local racetrack betting bar, a beer cafeteria, and a hotel restaurant-- but had a great time nonetheless! Chris and I found increasingly better food and drink as the weekend wore on!

We got up bright and early on Saturday and headed for the show just a few minutes away in Wicker Park. Pulaski Park Fieldhouse is a beautiful old community building with Eastern European architectural details-- a wonderful place for a show!


Here's my table in the morning-- lots of natural sunlight in this venue!


I had a little time to shop on Sunday morning--this show had over one hundred and fifty vendors-- and my favorites were the printers, of course. I got plenty of loot, but my absolute favorites were concert posters from Spike Press. They were selling slightly irregular/botched hand screened posters for $5-- considering I really only hang the misprints of my own work up, I thought they'd fit right in!

picked up this poster for the National with super fun hanging clothes and lovely shades o'green!


and one for Rogue Wave with gold gates!
(photos from spike press' site on gigposters)


also picked up a little letterpress note card from Michelle at Ann Arbor's own Elevated Press (which I framed and stuck up on wall)

(photo: elevated press)

We took off for home on Monday, and I got right to work putting together the Etsy sale (going on now!-- Buy One Get One!) and have been cleaning and organizing my supplies and inventory since.

I have lots to blog about in the coming days and weeks-- a few local projects, an online feature, and plans rolling into next year. See you next time!

Saturday, December 12, 2009

Holiday Show Recap: Part 1

I sold prints at two holiday craft shows this season, and had a blast at both!

First was Detroit Urban Craft Fair on November 21st. I have only one lousy camera phone shot from this show because it was absolute crafty madness from open to close. I sold so much work that I had to ask for backup frame delivery service to the venue, (thanks to my friend Ms. Going) where I framed woodcut prints at my table for the better part of the afternoon. I had purchased a batch of frames for DUCF and Renegade, and left at the end of the day with one frame from that entire batch.

My table was right between Phantom Limb's incredible paper goods:


(wouldn't these little library pockets make the best little cards to go with gifts?!)


and My Vintage Kitschen (lovely applique flour sack towels):



Both of these ladies will be at Holiday Crafternoon next weekend with a handful of other wonderful vendors-- if you're in the area and have some last minute shopping to attend to, I highly recommend you stop by!

Just prior to this show I decided to start taking credit cards, and while I don't have a system perfected for taking them yet (this is where I justify buying an iphone) I saw a huge leap in sales.
Handmade Detroit has really put indie art in Michigan on the map, and I'm so happy they gave me the opportunity to be a part of the community they've created this year.

Here's a video from the show!

Detroit Urban Craft Fair from Final Five Productions on Vimeo.



After DUCF I rushed back to work to prepare for the Thanksgiving Pilgrimager. Trader Joe's gets absolutely bananas this time of year-- in the art dept. we rush around like mad little elves to get signage and decor out for two flyers inside of three weeks! Here's my vestibule design for Thanksgiving, complete with a barely visible 8 yard burlap canopy!


I had so much fun arranging the table to look like a messy kitchen-- lots of vintage kitchen bits mixed in with baking and cooking products!

After Thanksgiving I got right to work on prints for Renegade Handmade. My most successful print of this group was a bird in a tree carried over from my woodcut edition. These all but vanished the first day of the show-- and I'm already planning to bring them back in the future!



Last Friday we packed the car to the gills and headed to Chicago for the Renegade Craft Fair Holiday Sale! Expect to hear all about it tomorrow!

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Goings On

I am so slacking on the blog front, its true-- but not because I haven't been busy! Here's a wee update of what's new!


I met my new friend Heidi at last year's Craft Revival, where she picked up some framed prints, and I recently put together a nice-sized order of work for her to sprinkle around her gorgeous home. She sent me some photos for you to peruse:


Robin's Nest, Forest Floor, Petoskey Stones and Bracken Fern in a block of four--with a swanky lamp I can't stop eying and a really cute orange tabby in the foreground!


Remus on white in the bedroom over a mounted plate makes for a
sweet combination against her soft blue walls.

Thanks again Heidi, for sending these photos in. Heidi is an interior designer by trade and a founding member of MICE, so I'm really honored that she chose support my artistic endeavors!

I will take this opportunity again to remind you that if you send in photos of your new prints I offer a 20% discount on any future print purchase from the Etsy shop.

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Speaking of MICE, organizer Kate Kehoe is putting on a show next month to help raise money for its senior center. I will not be able to attend, but put together a poster for the event. If you're free you should stop in for this rare opportunity to support the arts and an important community resource here in Ypsilanti.


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In other news...



I am working on a commission for Ann Arbor's own Carillon Chocolates. Alex, who runs the show over at Carillon, contacted me after the Jamboree last month to get some work up on the shops freshly painted blue and green walls. I am currently working on a series of 4 images (12 prints in all) for the shop with local/food themes that will be finished by the end of the month! The best part: I will be printing on the same burlap sacks the shop's coffee comes in, making the entire venture a green and happy one!

Did I mention I love this little shop? They roast all of their coffee in-house, use local vendors, and have a glass counter lined with beautiful confections-- just like your favorite childhood candy store. You will be transported, I promise. They're very conveniently located right on Main St. between Liberty and Williams-- I would highly recommend you stop in! (psst: they have $2
Lattes on Mondays!)

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And a show update:


After I wrap up this sweet project for Carillon, I will jumping head first into holiday preparations, and at that point we might as well kiss this blog goodbye. (just kidding) Seriously though, I have my work cut out for me. I mentioned in my last post that I will be returning to the Detroit Urban Craft Fair on November 21st. Since then I have also been accepted to sell work at the Renegade Craft Fair Holiday Sale in Chicago on December 5th and 6th! This will be my first attempt trafficking prints over state lines, and I'm really excited to spend a weekend in the windy city!


And then the Holiday SuperSale of Awesome will commence in the Etsy shop!
That's the tentative name.

And now if you'll excuse me, I need to add 14 million tags to this post-- I probably should have split all of this information up over a couple weeks!


Sunday, August 16, 2009

For the Win!

Hiawatha Birches and Robin's Nest are both currently featured and for sale on the prints section of the Renegade Handmade online shop! I have just one more of these left in my inventory at home right now, but I'm thinking about another similar edition for fall.




And I have another new woodcut in the works-- working title: forest floor. When its done I'll show it to ya! I'd also love to throw up some photos of my newly designed retail packaging and business card stamp one of these days! I really need to find more time-- hopefully this nice weather will subside soon and I can go back to holing up in the apartment with my ink and ideas. How do you people in temperate climates get anything done?!

Thursday, August 6, 2009

The End of Summer

I'm winding down summer with a handful of shows-- now that they're all confirmed, I thought I'd share.

First up!


August 14 & 21, 7-10 pm
Crossroads Summer Festival, Ypsilanti
Washington Street/Downtown
A free summer concert series Friday nights through August in historic downtown Ypsilanti. I'll be selling framed woodcut prints and screen prints two Fridays in a row!



Also in Ypsitucky, I mean, Ypsilanti:


September 4 & 5
The Jamboree, Ypsilanti
Riverside Park/Depot Town
A two-day festival over Labor Day weekend featuring lots of favorite local bands, artists and beers. Cheap admission, lawn chairs, and foot-stomping all on the banks of my favorite local river. I will be introducing new woodcuts at this show, in addition to screen prints.


And my first time selling work in Funky Ferndale:


September 19-20
DIY Street Fair, Ferndale
E 9 Mile and Woodward
Handmade Detroit Tent
A free 2-day show that celebrates the DIY ethic in everything from arts, music, food and homebrewing. I will be selling screen prints under the Handmade Detroit Tent. The Handmade Detroit Tent is code for: the most creative energy per square inch ever witnessed-- its really worth a look!

Not in Metro Detroit?
I have also updated the Etsy shop with some new screen prints from this summer-- more are on the way!

After spending the last few weeks putting my brand new retail vendor hat on, I'm happy to announce that my first batch of prints has been shipped to Renegade Handmade, an actual brick and mortar store in the spirit of the popular indie art fair. If you find yourself in Chicago stop in and take a look-- the last few prints from many best-sellers are there!


Other tricks up my sleeve:
- an online tutorial on how you can start making prints with bits you have laying around your apartment
- more retail
- if i can manage to keep up, the return of mixed media and embroidery into my work!

Monday, June 29, 2009

Big Things in the Works!

In case you haven't noticed, I took it upon myself to take a little 'online' sabbatical for a few weeks. The dust-bunnies blowing around my Etsy shop and blog have been offset with frantic printing. The scale and duration of my next show is huge and totally new for me, so I'm trying to make lots and lots of prints. In the meantime I have become significantly more frequent with the tweeting-- please feel free to stop in there if you'd like!

I've also been thinking a lot about how to take things to 'the next level' after that, so it was very fitting that I received an email from Sue Daly of Renegade Handmade inviting me to sell work in her Chicago store. I am a huge fan of her and her husband Mat's work-- (he's one of only a handful of people I can find who use the same screen print process as I do!) and am well aware that it doesn't get much awesomer than Renegade, so I promptly accepted!


click to visit!


All right, back to work-- I've reworked some pieces with amazing success in addition to entirely new designs-- will be posting photos shortly!