First fair outside Sheffield…
Posted on | February 5, 2010 | No Comments
I’m all booked in for a fair and it’s my first outside of Sheffield. Isn’t that strange? I can’t believe I’ve never been to a fair in another city before! I was always put off the idea because I don’t drive and thought it’d be too difficult to get anywhere. For the moment I’m sticking to nice and easy places – this next fair is in Nottingham and it’s right by the train station. Also I have my lovely suitcase so will pack as much in as I can carry and then I’m off!
Here is the flyer, the fair is at the Hopkinson Gallery and the event is Apples and Pears and Crafty Wares market. If you happen to be around in Nottingham next week do come and say hello!
Big delivery…
Posted on | February 3, 2010 | No Comments
Monday was a really exciting day – I had a lovely big delivery! My washout booth arrived and also 5 new screens, things don’t get any more exciting than this! I was at the library in the morning so had to rush in to town to wait for my delivery, I just made it!
Things were a little stressed for about 20 minutes as I watched my hubby and handy studio manager Stuart struggle to get it up 2 floors but they say it looked harder than it was. You should have heard the noise though, the galvanised steel made it sound like thunder rumbling through the building!
Here is the booth all in place:
All it needs now is to be plumbed in – in the meantime that’s what the orange bucket is for! Excuse the extremely dirty floor – it’s not really dirt but photo emulsion!
Here are my pretty new screens:
These are the largest screens I’ve ever printed with and I can’t wait to pull my first print from them. I usually make up my own screens but the size of these meant that I couldn’t do them myself so I’ve have them made up for me instead, they’re also my first aluminium screens, my usual ones are homemade wooden ones.
Again I have to say a HUGE thank you to SENTA, those of you who’ve been following my blog will know that my washout booth wouldn’t be here without help and a microgrant from SENTA!
Little bit of press…
Posted on | January 28, 2010 | No Comments
I was lucky enough to be in an article in this Saturday’s Yorkshire Post Magazine, I knew it was happening obviously but it was still a bit of a shock!
I had a phone interview a couple of weeks ago with a writer called Sharon Dale, I’ve never done anything like that before so it was a bit strange but she was really lovely. The article was going to focus on 4 designers all based in Yorkshire, one from textiles, lighting, woodwork and furniture. I sent her some images of my work to use too and was really surprised to see my photos taking up most of the front page, slightly scary actually!
Here’s the article first page:
I’ve had quite a bit of contact because of it too which is great so I’ve been busy this week sending out some samples and also sorting out the washout booth and the 5 screens I’m getting made at the same time. Hopefully they will all be here next week so my plan to start printing and selling by the metre is getting closer by the minute!
I included a sample of my new heavy weight fabric too – that’s the pale blue brolly piece. It’s a great fabric, a 10 oz hemp and cotton mix that looks like a denim twill. It’s really hard wearing so it’d be great for cushions. That’s another job for this week though, washing and preparing the fabric!
I got my grant!
Posted on | January 23, 2010 | 1 Comment
I’m so excited – I got my grant approved! I really expected to be turned down as my business advisor said people were often turned down and had to resubmit information, but he phoned and gave me the good news Thursday!
Here is a picture of the kind of booth I’ll be getting:
I’d seen many on the internet – they all look pretty similar. Here is the nicest I’ve found though:
Isn’t this gorgeous! It was made by Like Butter for the fabulous Ink and Spindle – unfortunately they are based in Australia so there wasn’t much chance of having one shipped over - plus think of the airmiles! Mine is coming from York so not too far away at all.
I’m not the kind to normally fall in love with machinery but I suppose there is sentimental attachment here too as it means a huge leap for my business! Even though my booth wont be quite as pretty I’ll still love it!
Hopefully I’ll have it in about 2 or 3 weeks so I’ll take lots of pictures once it’s all installed.
We’re moving!
Posted on | January 17, 2010 | No Comments
Our offer on the house we really wanted was accepted so we’re moving! With a bit of luck in 2-3 months we’ll be in our own house – let’s just hope the survey doesn’t show up anything nasty! It was the first house we looked at and is on the road I’ve wanted to live on for quite a while so hopefully it’ll be a lovely home for me, the hubby and the pugs. It’s got it’s own private access too (no more shared terrace access for us!) and it’s own back garden with lawn, patio and vegetable patch! It’ll be so nice to have somewhere that the dogs can actually run around, our house at the moment has the tiniest graveled yard and nothing else. Even before when we had a lawn the dogs didn’t really have enough room to run around and we had to fence it off as we shared a back yard with 3 other houses. I can’t wait to actually feel like we have at least a bit of privacy and no-one walking past the dogs every five minutes and making them bark!
So this week it’s lots of trips to the solicitors and getting the survey sorted out, I’ll keep you posted on the progress.
All this house moving idea has got me tidying and clearing out. We’re downgrading to a 2 bedroom house from a 3 bedroom house so I need to get rid of a few things, today I cleared out my huge fabric collection – that wasn’t easy! Next it’ll be the knitting and other crafty bits and bobs. Even though I’m getting rid of things I’m also thinking about buying new things, here is a new book by Jenny Hart:
I love her embroidery books, I have them all – and also a fair few of her kits! I might have to order this one next time I’m feeling like I’m due a little pressie!
What a week…
Posted on | January 11, 2010 | No Comments
It’s been a funny old week here – here in Yorkshire we’ve had more beautiful snow (although it’s getting a bit slippy now!) but it looks sooooo pretty! Also I’ve been house hunting and looked at lots of horrible houses and one really nice one (hubby is making an offer today so cross your fingers). Then there has been my jury service which is just too strange – also it’s causing havoc with my business. The day job was nice and easy to sort though as I have two weeks off from the library but will try and squeeze in to the studio whenever I can after I finish.
The strangest thing that happened to me this past week was that I was called by a lovely writer at the Yorkshire Post who did a phone interview with me late on Wednesday last week. I then had to send her some images of my work to go in the paper so I’ll keep you posted about when it’s going to be in!
Also another bit of good news is that I may have found 2 new wholesalers – I don’t want to say until it’s all confirmed so again, I’ll keep you posted!
Whilst all this has been going on my hubby has had a really difficult week – his MA is finally coming to an end which means after three years I finally get him back! Yippee! Lots of deadlines this week for him though so it’s all been a bit fraught – also this on top of the house hunting doesn’t help his stress level! We managed to go out for a nice walk in the beautiful snow last Tuesday though and he took lots of pictures so that was a lovely hour of peace and tranquility. There’s nothing like a bit of snow to make Woodseats hush up – here is a glimpse.
Wholesalers?
Posted on | January 6, 2010 | 1 Comment
One of my missions for 2010 is find some wholesalers for my fabrics. I sell to 6 different shops and galleries for my accessories and knitting products but I’d really like to be able to find some shops to stock my fabrics. Hand printed fabrics are a bit of a specialised market though so the best thing to do is try and trawl the internet methinks! I’ve seen a couple so now I just have to have some pretty pictures and with a bit of luck someone will like them enough to stock them!
If anyone has any suggestions of lovely places which might be suitable then please get in touch!
I took some lovely new pictures of my fabrics though just before Christmas, including the new colourways of Bird Brolly:
I’m still in limbo a bit as far as doing larger pieces of fabric goes, I’m eagerly awaiting the decision about my mini grant so cross your fingers that it all goes smoothly for me! I’ve applied for a grant to pay for a wash out booth – they cost a small fortune (mostly in the region of £1000) and it really is a very important piece of machinery for me! Without a wash out booth I can’t wash out larger screens – without larger screens I can’t easily print larger pieces of fabric which scuppers my plans to start selling fabrics by the meter. At the moment I have a beautiful old ceramic Belfast type sink which is lovely and does the job but only for smallish screens, hence the washout booth. Also if I’m successful with my grant I’m going to order 5 large screens at the same time (because I also don’t have the facilities to expose large screens – my exposure box is too small!) three will be designs already in production – Bird cage, Perky Polka and Bird Brolly and then they’ll be two new designs to print which is so exciting! It will be a great investment too as I’ll be getting it custom made to fit my studio and I’ve made sure it’ll be big enough to fit the largest screen that I would ever need to use – which will hopefully be when I actually start employing someone – that’s on my 5 year plan!
Happy New Year everyone!
Posted on | January 5, 2010 | No Comments
I’s 2010 and where here have I been? Not on here – that’s for sure! Ok, here’s a quick round up of the last month:
Julefest fair was lots of fun – not very busy as far as sales go, especially for those of us not selling ‘child friendly products’ but i had a good day chatting with the fabulous extended Craft Candy family! Here is my half of the stall and the gorgeous tree that sat in the middle of the room!
That was my last fair of December – I was supposed to be doing one of the Craft Candy minis but unfortunately it was cancelled due to a power failure at the venue! I then spent the rest of December making daily trips to the post office in town with lots of packages for lovely Etsy and Folksy buyers!
Christmas came and went – me and the hubby spent our first Christmas apart in about 10 years (boo hoo) but he had a lovely time at his parents in North Yorkshire, frolicking around in the snow on Christmas day and taking pictures of happy looking sheep!
I got lots of lovely Christmas presents including a sock monkey bought for me from Siansburys by the lovely hubby! She’s called Tara and likes skiing in the French alps and drinking schnapps!
Then hubby came down with a snotty cold and gave it me so New Year completely passed me by as I spent 2 days in bed. I actually woke up on the 2nd and thought it was New Years Day! I didn’t even have chance to make any new years resolutions! I have two though that have been swimming through my head – 1. Make better use of my time as far as my business goes and 2. Try and be happier and have a more positive attitude about things!
Julefest…
Posted on | December 2, 2009 | No Comments
I get really REALLY excited about Christmas so you can imagine how excited I am about doing 2 Christmas fairs in as many weeks! Here is the next one and it has a lovely flyer which I’m mentioned on! (My old name is anyway!) I’ll be sharing with the hugely talented Sian of Siansburys so I can assume the day will be spent eating cake, nattering and hugging monkeys! Come down and see us!
What a November…
Posted on | November 30, 2009 | 1 Comment
Don’t you just love this time of year? The weather get’s lovely and cold and all the Christmas festivities start! I’ve had a mad few weeks making like a crazy lady for a few events. Firsly it was for Open studios at Yorkshire Artspace which was on 20th and 21st November. I’ve only been in my studio since July so this is the first Open Studios I’ve ever taken part in and I loved it! I’ve sat in with my hubby in his studio before but it’s not the same as actually doing it with your own studio. At times I felt a little like a museum exhibit but most people were interested in finding out about screen printing so it was really nice to meet everyone and also to see a different audience than I usually get at the craft fairs.
Here was my table layout, I also put out some larger peices of fabric I’d printed and my linen upholstery weight fabric seemed to get the most attention as most people seemed interested in knowing when I would start printing by the metre.
That great event was then quickly followed by another – a trip to York for my 29th birthday, the less said about me getting older the better though. Moving swiftly on…
Then the big event came, the one I’ve been preparing for months for – Candy Cane Christmas craft Fair. It’s really hard to organise an event and take part in it, it’s definitely introduced me to a new level of stress that I had no idea existed before! I had a wonderful time this weekend though – Christmas tunes, gorgeous craft, mulled wine and mince pies – it doesn’t get any better! Here was my stall:
We had over 1000 visitors to the fair over the weekend which was fantastic! Saturday was really busy, Sunday was a bit quieter but then the torrential rain didn’t help things! I’m now looking forward to a lovely long break from the fairs and then we’ll be back in the New Year with Spring Fling at Millennium Galleries on 27th March!
I have another fair next weekend too at Clifford School on Psalter Lane from 11-3pm, it’s called Julefest and is a fabulous sounding Scandinavian style craft fair – I can’t wait!
keep looking »
Craft Fair Countdown
- Apples and Pears and Crafty Wares, Nottingham:
in 0 weeks, 4 days - Craft Candy Spring Fling 2010, Sheffield:
in 1 month, 2 weeks, 4 days
