Handmade Nation

New York. Part 2
June 17th
Renegade Craft Fair. 150 vendors from around the country. 90 degree heat.

We showed up at about 9:30 and met up with Alison who had agreed to sell my Flying Fish stuff so I could work on the film and make some money at the same time. Miss. Alison rules, everyone should have one of her vinyl wristlets!!!

My mini table that Allison watched over!

We scoped out the fair and I was reminded of the size of the show. 150+ vendors is a TON of work being shown at one place.

Micaela and I set out to scout the scene; there were a bunch of people I had talked to ahead of time that I wanted to touch base with. Leah Kramer of Craftster.org was our first interview of the day. She just released a book and we talked about that, what’s it like to have developed a site that has over 60,000 registered users and her involvement with both Magpie and Boston Bazaar Bizarre. What a lady!!Leah Kramer of Craftster.org

It took us 4 hours; yes 4 hours to get around the circumference of the show. I was entirely overwhelmed with the amount of people who wanted to talk about the film, meeting vendors who sell at my shop and discovering new work that I fell in love with.

Besides lots and lots of "beauty shots" we actually only did one other interview on Saturday, which was with Dennis Stevens a self proclaimed “craft theorist” who writes for the blog redefiningcraft.com. Dennis found Micaela and I dragging our feet in the heat and told us that Garth (yay extreemcraft.com) had mentioned we would be there shooting and he wanted to talk with us about the many theories of the methodologies behind d.i.y. craft, the third wave of feminism related to craft, where d.i.y craft and American Craft are similar and many other interesting things. It was a suburb interview and I’m so glad he found us!

Micaela & Dennis

Towards the end of the show I realized I couldn’t deal with doing any more interviews, I was on the verge of heat stroke and we called it a day. Dinner was to be had with my friend Jacob of Ex Libris and his rad friend Melissa.

Micaela, Melissa & Jacob- after fair drink!

Day #2 in New York was great!

June 18th
Since we had missed the boat with doing a lot of interviews on Saturday we had to bust our butts to get a lot done Sunday. The heat gods sent down there wrath of burley rays and we globbed on sunscreen and jumped into the show headfirst right away.

We spoke with Sarah Neuburger of the small object to start the day. I am a super fan of all of Sarah’s work so it was exciting to get to talk with her on camera.

Next Jennifer Corace, artist and illustrator extraordinaire spoke with us about her merging of art, craft and design. I also picked up some of her new postcards with a nautical theme for my flat files.

Sharing a booth with Jennifer was Deb Dormody of I’FN books. We talked with her about bookbinding, her involvement with the craft community and her company’s growth in the past few years. She also donated a beautiful journal for our etsy shop (not listed as of yet…. dang missing digital camera). Thanks Deb!

We then spent over an hour talking with the ladies from the Austin Craft Mafia. We did interviews with Jenny Hart who gave advice on how to protect your designs, working and balancing your art and having a business that takes off faster than you can say doilies.

Jenny Hart & Micaela

Susann Keohane and Hope Perkins spoke with us about their involvement with the DIY network and their show Stylelicious, they also charmed our pants of with their drawls….

Tina Sparkles talked with us about Austin’s Stitch Festival, quitting her day job to Tina Sparkles full time and staying ahead of the game with creativity and style. Jennifer Perkins of Naughty Secretary Club shared her story about making her life full time crafty, balancing her business with co-hosting Stylelicious and her own show Craft Lab.

Faythe & Jennifer of Naughty Secretary Club

And the lovely Vickie Howell of DIY’s Knitty Gritty talked about her new book “Not Another Teen Knitting Book”. She also talked about making art and craft available for youth to keep them out of trouble and spoke about the value of handmade work in our generation.

Let me just say that the Austin Craft Mafia ladies are an inspiring group of women that I have some serious respect for. They have fun, they have community and they are hella crafty!

Right across the way was the Portland Super Crafty Booth. We got to talk to the three members who were in attendance, Cathy Pitters of Bossa Nova Baby, Torie Nguyen of Totinette and Susan Beal of Susan Stars.

Cathy, Tori & Susan of Portland Super Crafty

I was excited to talk to them about their book “Super Crafty” saving the world from mass production. We also got to talk about what they are individually working on and where they see the craft movement heading. Also all three of the ladies donated stuff for the etsy shop as well as a signed copy of the book (all up next week I promise)!! Thanks girls!

Over to the Art Star booth where we met the owners Megan Brewster and Erin Waxman. These ladies have all sorts of ties to the craft community including there own indie show Art Star Bazaar (which we sadly missed due to overbooked lives). I got to ask them all my burning questions about their gallery, what it’s like to have a shop in Philly and there plans for the future. I heart Art Star our (the Paper Boat, my shop in Milwaukee) sister shop to the east!!

Phewy!! That was all we could squeeze in… like I mentioned before we missed some interviews I was really hoping to get, but we’ll catch up with everyone I promise.

Also, all the donations for the etsy.com shop will be updated after this weekend of madness- Art vs. Craft and my shop the Paper Boat Boutique & Gallery moving into our new space. As my boyfriend would say, it’s a craftastrophe!