Cookie 2: Accessorize Surprise

Using scraps to make accessories has been something that I've been exploring. Here are two hair clips made with the leftover materials from the bags we made.

I think they are fantastic!

The Colorful Bug that Bit Me

“I’ve been bitten by the _______ bug” is what a person might exclaim when a new and exciting form of creative expression enters their life and they become smitten. Last Wednesday it became clear that the fabric bug had bitten me.

That morning I got to work and read my “daily good stuff” Daily Candy New York and DailyOM. Daily Candy’s feature was a group of sample sales and one of them caught my eye. It was for Lulu Dk on September 17-18. Lulu DK is a textile designer with playful graphics and color choices that I like. I stored the information in my head and thought, “Today and tomorrow are hectic. There is no way I’ll make it to the sale”. Lunch came and went and I kept working, still wondering, and telling myself that I was too busy. As the day progressed, I thought about the sale from time to time.

By 3:00p I could not contain myself any longer. I had to go. I checked HopStop.com and became aware that the bus was the most effective way for me to travel. I headed to Madison Avenue for the short ride uptown. I arrived at the location. A stylish woman greeted me and instructed me that the sale was in the back, and there it was, one box of fabric leaning next to a bookshelf. I thought, “You’ve got to be kidding me”. There were other products to purchase that Lulu DK produced, from the fabrics, but only a small amount of fabric to buy and it was $29 per yard. A few minutes later I returned to the street and headed back downtown on a very slow bus.

Somehow I retuned to work in a chipper mood about my decision to attend the sale. Shouldn’t I have been bitter? I purchased nothing and my little jaunt would cost me an extra hour in the office. I sat in front of my computer and pondered the question: Where do creative urges come from? Why and when do they happen? What is the best way to harness this energy into something special?

If you’ve been bitten, I’d love to hear about it…

Something New

Tonight I enrolled in Typography I at NYU. I am really excited about starting classes again because it is an opportunity for me to have fun and learn something new. I promise to share some of what I learn in a future blog.

Here’s a “Try This” exercise that is in Living The Creative Life by Rice Freeman-Zachery (see the full list of Creative Reads at the bottom of the page).

Sign up for a class or workshop in something you’ve always wanted to know more about: pottery, pen and ink drawing, quilting, collage. Go in with no expectations. The Best thing that can happen is that doing so will open the door to adventures you can’t even imagine. The worst-case scenario is that you may find this medium or technique isn’t for you, but even so, rest assured that your time won’t be wasted: Things you’ve learned in a workshop tend to find their way into seemingly unrelated work when you least expect it. For example, the color mixing you study in a painting class may be perfect when you begin to dye your own fabric.

Sharing can be fun, let me know if you try something new. I’d love to hear what happened!

Cookie 1: A Little Spark is Born

If you’re like me you love a good street fair, the food, people watching, and cheap earrings are enough to keep a girl happy for a while. This past Sunday, my zany neighbor/creative partner, Jennifer, and I put ourselves on the other side of the table and decided to be a vendor at the Flatbush Frolic. The Flatbush Frolic is a street fair that’s been a part of Brooklyn’s history for 31 years.

As you know from my last entry, we made tote bags from fabrics that were going to be thrown away. The material that we used was a micro suede from Italy and we had about 20 different colors of it. There were no wrong combinations; we placed fuchsia on chocolate, camel with powder blue, slate grey coupled with crimson, olive against sienna—the colors all seemed to somehow resonate with one another. The bags were "green" without literally being green.

We ended up making 14 totes and we sold 4 (we picked two to keep for ourselves)! I think we could have sold more but we decided to price them at $25 because our friends said we’d be crazy to sell them for anything less, and we agreed. The reactions that we got from every visitor who came to our table were positive. One woman took our contact information because she’d like to consider placing them in a gift shop and another asked for our web address because she wanted to tell her friends about our products (web address? We just got an email account the night before). This made me very happy!

I learned so much from this experience and am amazed that we were able to take a pile of remnants and a vision to introduce something new. We had fun too—the work and the idea came together perfectly.






I’d like to give a really BIG thank you to Cozbi for taking the time to help us sew smart, Craig for giving Jennifer the fabrics, Leanne and Melinda for coming to the fair, and Kamau for sharing ideas and putting up with a messy “Studio W” during production.

Flatbush Frolic

This Sunday my wonderful co-designing partner, Jennifer, and I will be at the Flatbush Frolic selling tote bags made from rescued upholstery fabrics. Come & check us out.

Please wish us a dazzling debut!!!

Fashion Inspired Design

“CREATIVE” is a sticker that I have proudly worn throughout my life; it’s been a recurring theme. But somehow my creative sensibilities never spun off into a medium that set me at a canvas, potter’s wheel, or under the limelight. This made it hard for me to picture myself as a creative type living a creative life. The artists I knew all had something tangible that they could produce and share with the world, or at the very least, with those who they loved. I was an art dabbler picking up what I felt, were ittsy bittsy wobbly fragments. These were the fibers that my “CREATIVE sticker” was made from.

When I moved to NYC something awoke in me, I had to get serious about nurturing my inner artist so that she could emerge. Design has always had an emotional impact on me. I decided that graphic design would become my art. I immediately enrolled in a few courses at NYU in digital and graphic design and discovered that I had found something that if I worked hard enough, I could be good at.

I love fashion too. You can find me frequenting high-end boutiques, thrift stores, select retail chains, and friend’s closets across America. I enjoy experimenting with mixing different patterns, styles, colors, and decades. Now that I am learning to sew, I’ve been able to bring a few of my own ideas into existence.

If I had to define my aesthetic I would call it “smarty art chic”. I plan to weave elements of fashion and textiles into my work as a graphic designer to make fashion inspired design.


Here’s what is inspiring me now:

A sampling of fabrics from a Fiber Notion charm pack. Fiber Notion is a store filled with eye-popping goodies for people who like to get their craft on. I plan to feature Fiber Notion in a future posting. Click the image to enlarge.

Mixing the Old with the New

If I would have known that living a creative life simply meant changing only the way that I look at the world, I would have done things differently a long time ago. I wonder if being a late bloomer to this simple wisdom is for better or for worse? Being the optimist that I am, I have to say for the better. My logic is this: since I went longer than most artists, knowing this truth, and saw things as I thought they were I likely missed some wonderment and inspiration along the way. I think this gives me a broader range of being able to appreciate objects, both, for what they are and what they can be. I am now better at seeing new uses for old things.

If you are looking for inspiration, sit and think of new ways to see some of the older things that surround you. You’ll be surprised at what you come up with.