Happy New Year!

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Image: Lindsay Thomas Ceramics.Go to Lindsay’s website for more information http://ltceramics.co.uk/

Events in 2019

Hi and Happy New Year to everyone!

Just want to give you the heads up about fairs in 2019.

Christmas Fair 2019 I’m moving the Christmas fair forward this year, to November 9th.  We always used to have the fairs in November, at the beginning of the Christmas shopping period, and it seemed to work better for both shoppers and stallholders.  It will also coincide with Headingley Farmers Market which works well for everyone.

Stallholders’ need-to-know: We’re also going to have a new application system, to give people a fairer chance of getting in and to continue to get the best quality makers.  So this year, applications will be a deadline, and stallholders will be selected all at the same time.  I know people like to know whether they’ve got in early on though so they can schedule the rest of their Christmas fairs, so we’ll open applications early in the Spring.

Craft Clearout  For the past couple of years we’ve had a Craft Clearout/Destash sale in the Spring.  Unfortunately I don’t have the capacity to run one this year, which I know will disappoint many, as it’s a great way of getting hold of some lovely crafty goodies and of clearing out your cupboards.  But I’m going to set up an online selling event in the Spring for anyone to sell their goodies.  You’d have to be prepared to post or have people collect whatever you’re selling, and their will be a few rules about what you can and can’t sell, but other than that, anyone can join in.  You will be expected to advertise it like mad to all your friends, customers and followers obviously!

So, that’s it for now.  Please keep an eye on the Facebook page and your inboxes for further news.

Becky
Design@HEART

 

 

For the love of wood

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Gavin Edwards is another newcomer to Design@HEART, bringing his interesting and original wood work.  He has had many careers, and his current one draws on all the others, as he tells us in this latest blog.  

Working with wood is my latest career choice, having previously worked as a Cartographer, Field Archaeologist, Archaeological Curator and finally as Museum Collections Manager.  An unconventional background perhaps, but I have always enjoyed working with wood, so I didn’t want to feel that I never had the opportunity to explore where my love of wood might take me.

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My experiences as an archaeologist, as well as working with museum collections, has made me appreciate just how much human material culture and technological development has relied on the physical properties of wood. Indeed, our relationship with trees stretches back to the very origins of our own species, but there is so much more to wood than just its physical properties. There is an intrinsic beauty about its internal structuring, the natural grain and colour, which is something I always hope to enhance and take advantage of through the use of very simple and structured forms.

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I like to use a wide range of native and non-native woods, birch plywood and reclaimed wood to create what I refer to as decorative wall panels rather than ‘wall art’. In most cases the design element of my work is driven by the same desire to highlight and show off the character and quality of the wood, and on occasions it can be an unusual feature in a piece of wood that is the inspiration for the design of the finished piece.

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Bringing out the very best qualities of the wood is achieved by hand sanding down all the surfaces to a very fine level and then applying a hard clear wax finish before further applications of a semi solid wax finish. I do not use varnishes as I want these items to develop their own history by accumulating the dents and scratches of time, which are more easily ‘soften’ by additional applications of wax finish. Again it is the quality and appearance of the wood that matters most, which is why I prefer to use simple forms. The only time I use stains or paint, is when making the baseboards which are measured up and made to support the other pieces of wood that have already been cut and arranged to create the overall design.

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The basic layout and design of some of my pieces can be repeated, but the appearance of each completed one will always be unique due to variations in the wood itself and the hand-crafted nature of its construction.

Silver and Stone by Helen Drye

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Back in April we featured Helen Drye on our blog, talking about her work and influences.  She’s popped back to give us a bit of an update about her current work. We can’t wait to see the new collections.

I started Silver and Stone Jewellery in July 2012. I did the classic, turning a hobby into a business. It has given me the opportunity to be flexible in my work pattern around family and home.

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This year though I’m coming out of my shell and talking about myself in my branding – By Helen Drye.  This feels very strange to me!  I’ve always hidden behind my Silver and Stone branding, and I’m well known for teaching jewellery making under this name.

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2018 is a year for launching my own new ranges of jewellery and showing just what inspires me. The first range that I launched earlier in the year was my Woodland Collection, a range of individual pieces of jewellery inspired by Skipwith Common Nature Reserve, near York.  This is just next to my studio.  When things get a bit much, I like to go for a walk in the Common. Skipwith Common is a National Nature  Reserve, a beautiful woodland and common land, with rare breads roaming around. You can wander through the common and see deer, black sheep, and then have a pony walk in front of you! It is truly stunning, but shhhh – don’t tell anyone. You’ll see the trees in my designs, to me there is something mystical about the Common. This area has been common land for centuries, but during the Second World War it was a RAF training base. You can still see some of the remains, but the trees are reclaiming their land. It is such a contrast, and a testament to how nature reclaims its own.

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My Woodland Collection has done very well.  I love the fact that each piece is different.

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My next range will be my Contemporary Range.  A minimal unfussy silver range of jewellery.  Modern in design and very wearable for every day.  This range incorporates the jewellery that I want to wear every day, silver jewellery that doesn’t date, and will go with anything!  I will be launching this in October, so look out for it at my Christmas events.

As we run up to Christmas, I am making time for designing and making.  I have less workshops, more exhibitions and events and less teaching.  I’ll be back to the workshops in January, when I find that I have a busy time – they make ideal gifts for Christmas, something creative to do when it’s cold and dark!

 

 

 

 

 

Heart of Glass

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Sarah Wade of Garage Glass Studio is back this December with her charming fused glass products.  We asked her about her making process and how she got started.

My interest in fused glass developed from my interest in stained glass which I did as a hobby for a number of years. At one course I went on there was a kiln and we had a go at fusing glass. I was hooked, and ever since I have been fascinated with the things you can do with glass and a kiln.

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Warm glass or kiln-formed glass is the working of glass by heating it in a kiln. The processes used depend on the temperature reached and range from fusing and slumping to casting but doesn’t go much above 800 degrees centigrade. This differs from hot glass, where the artist works with molten glass with a temperature around 1000 degrees.

For the first few years my interest had to remain a hobby as I had a day job as an accountant, but four years ago I gave up that job and soon afterwards Garage Glass Studio was born. I have two small kilns in our garage and the glass is created there, hence the name.

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I did a City and Guilds level 3 in decorative glass course at night school, and I have been on a number of courses to learn specific techniques of glass making, but other than that I am self taught, adapting techniques I have learnt to create the images that I want to make, and learning how glass performs at different temperatures. I am particularly fascinated by the effects are created through the reactions between the chemicals in different glasses as they heat up.

 

Most of the inspiration for my work comes from the world around me, from the animals and plants that I see in the countryside in West Yorkshire. I love taking my wares to craft fairs and sharing it with people. It feels great when they look at your table and smile.

 

Firing up the kiln

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If you have visited Design@HEART before you may well have seen Lindsay Thomas’s work.  Lindsay is a potter, producing eyecatching home decorations using the ancient method of Raku, and incorporating her other love of textiles into her new work.  Here she is talking about her work and methods:

I have been making pots since 1995. I started by attending an evening class and enjoyed it so much I carried on. I was fortunate enough to use an inheritance from my father with which I bought a kiln.

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I was also able to attend two courses that influenced my work and inspired me to try to sell my work. The first course was a weekend in the wilds of Wales with Annie Horner where I learnt to build and fire a Raku kiln and I use this process in my work still.  The second was a week’s course with Peter Beard, an amazing potter who taught me to refine my work and encouraged me to go out and try and sell my work.

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As I loved the Raku process I used this and made work influenced by ancient standing stones and ancient rock art from Ilkley moor. My first selling event was Potfest in the Pens 2000, a show which I have attended every year since. I work from my little studio in my cellar and Raku firing my work in my homemade kiln outside in the garage with my husband being my extra pair of hands.

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Over the years my work has gone through various influences, the main one being natural forms and pebbles found in the beach. The beach theme expanded to beach huts and camper vans and I now include found object found in the beach such as driftwood.

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The Raku process is an ancient Japanese process used to make tea bowls. The work is made, bisque fired, glazed, and then fired again in my Raku Kiln. The Raku kiln is fired to 960degrees then the pots are taken out when red hot and placed in sawdust. This causes a reduction in heat and makes the glaze crackle and any unglazed part turns black.  The pots are then placed in water and cleaned up.

My other love is textiles and my new work is earthenware decorated with oxides and transparent glaze. I use hand dyed yarn by Jean Wildish at Wild Wood Wool to sew rock art designs into the pots.

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Sarah Dunton

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Sarah Dunton’s work went down very well last Christmas, so we’re having her back!  Here she is talking about her work:

I am a painter, potter and plant grower – and maker of small objects. I always drew as a child, and went on to study fine art at Leeds University.

My influences and inspirations are manifold, ranging from medieval art with its sturdy practicality, glorious disregard for proportion and delight in decoration, to the 20th century painters Paul Klee and Marc Chagall, whose work is often dreamlike.

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I learnt etching at Leeds, Morley College and Sir John Cass College in London and , much more recently, pottery at Swarthmore College.

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My work is derived from memory of things observed – I try to create calm-inducing and/or tactile work, which usually includes portrayals of birds and plants and occasionally people in their own worlds.

“Everything begins with a pencil!”

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One of many new faces at Design@HEART this December is Shaun Vickers, artist and illustrator.  Here, we have a look at his background and his current work, which is sure to strike a chord with many of our shoppers. 

Shaun has always worked within the creative sector, initially trained in Graphic Design in Leicester he was soon illustrating with an airbrush for Athena poster shops back in the 80’s which set him on a path within the greeting card and publishing industry, having successfully freelanced for many years, Shaun joined several top card and publishing companies as Design Manager, Creative Manager through to Art Director overseeing many successful design teams and creating award winning ranges for many high street retailers and grocers.

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Now working from his attic studio in the village of Baildon with expansive views over Baildon Moor, alongside rescued cat ‘Ozzy’ they get wonderful views of nature and life passing by.

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This new venture as ‘Fine Art by Shaun’ allows him the freedom to create his own work without any restrictions, despite being proficient in all medium’s the humble pencil has long been his medium of choice as it allows fine detail to be achieved and the final image to be constructed in a steady controlled manner.

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With a love of all things Nature and Wildlife and given the resurgence of the focus on nature conservation and awareness, pet owner Shaun thought it the right time to marry subject matter with traditional working. To strip the image of colour and focus on the detail and character of the subject matter is really important, as the work continues to evolve so does the variety of situations, poses and formatting for each piece. Whilst he’s passionate about the work he does, his commercial background also focuses on the fact the work has a relevant  appeal and value to the wider public and so mixes pet and equine commissions with the larger wildlife pieces to sell as originals, prints and cards. As well as illustrating all things nature he also works on pet and equine portrait commissions

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This year has seen Shaun exhibit at several town halls and galleries for the first time with his own work, still experimenting with subject matter and formats it’s been a good grounding for the future direction for his next set of illustrations. This year has also seen him showcase his work in all manner of forms at country and craft shows in Yorkshire and his native Leicestershire, meeting new customers, and engaging with other stall holders and building up relationships and friendships through the unique band of ‘Creative Makers’, “I’m really excited for the challenge and opportunities that lie ahead and I’m very much looking forward to attending Decembers Christmas Craft event at Design @ Heart 8th December…see you all there!”

Favourite quote:

“Everything begins with a pencil!”

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Everyone Loves Bags!

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Sue Turrill of Nuthatch Designs will be back at Design@HEART this December with her beautiful tweed bags.  Here she is talking about her work:

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When I was a small child I would spend weeks in the summer with my two siblings staying with our Grandmother and her two sisters.  That was when I really started creating things, using embroidery, sewing and knitting.  I remember spending hours with my Great Aunt Mary embroidering daisies around the edges of tray cloths, and I loved it.  Even from a young age needlecraft for me has always been a way of relaxing whilst producing something unique and useful.

I’ve since wanted to combine traditional methods I’d learnt with modern ways of life.  Everyone has some sort of electronic device and it seemed the obvious choice to incorporate my designs with natural fabrics to produce unique covers and cases to protect them.  Shortly after starting my business a good friend of mine said “why don’t you make bags? Everyone loves bags?”.  So after a bit of thinking I decided to give bags a go as well.  She was right of course and I love making them too!

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Natural fabrics are important to me as they combine durability with practicality meaning they will last but can also be recycled into something new in time.  I love the tactile nature of wool and the properties it has for retaining shape and repelling dirt. I’m sure my love of natural fabrics is in part linked to my love of nature.  I’ve always been drawn to wildlife and the countryside so the imagery I create on the smaller purses represents this part of my life,and it’s also why my shop name is Nuthatch Designs – it’s just my favourite bird.

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Wherever possible I try to champion British manufactured natural fabrics, and design and handmake the bags and cases I sell.   I absolutely love the heritage wool fabric Harris Tweed which is only produced under licence in the Outer Hebrides and now includes many brighter modern colourways from upcoming young weavers. In themselves they are a thing of beauty and I feel very lucky to be able to use them.

Nuthatch Designs will be at Design@HEART on Saturday 8th December at the HEART Centre, Bennett Road, Leeds LS6 3HN 

 

 

 

 

How To Choose A Good Fair

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For Artists and Makers

By Becky Moore, and with thanks to Alice Chandler and Jane Kay of Sunny Bank Mills Gallery, Anna Urwin of House of Bats and Shaun Vickers  for their contribution to this document.

I know it seems a long way off, but now is the time when stallholders are getting their Christmas fairs lined up.  Fairs are being advertised to stallholders and applications have to be sent in.  But how do stallholders know what is a good fair and what is a bad fair?

Last year, a number of people complained that they’d had stalls at fairs that were badly organised and publicised.  They were really fed up.  So a group of us – fair organisers and stall holders – got together to draw up some guidelines to help people avoid future disasters.

Organising a craft fair is a skill that not everyone has.  It takes a lot of work and dedication to get it just right, but even so, you can’t legislate against bad weather and you can’t force people to come to your event.  But the job of a fair organiser is to put the right stalls and products in front of the right customers.  That takes good curating, knowing your customer base, having a good venue, a marketing plan in place, and all the legalities such as insurance, policies on copyright, and so on, lined up.

The job of the stallholder is to spot not only which fairs are right for them, but also which fairs are well organised and professional.  It’s a tricky business.  And occasionally stallholders get stung.   People have asked “what can I do about it?”.  The answer is very little after the event.  But you can maximise your chances of choosing the good ones by knowing the right questions to ask.  The more people ask the questions, the more craft fair organisers will have to up their game and stop ripping people off.

This checklist has been put together by a team of fair organisers and experienced stallholders.  It is meant to guide you through the tricky process of spotting quality, well organised fairs to sell your goods at.  It won’t tell you which fairs will work for your products or artwork, but it will help you ask the right questions when deciding whether to apply.

Some fairs will have all these points on their websites or in their recruitment information.  If not, then we hope this checklist helps you ask the right questions. And you are allowed to ask!

Remember, fair organisers are selling a service to you.  You are their customer.  Make sure you are getting good value for money and good customer service.

****Download our PDF checklist here:  How To Choose A Good Fair ****

Choose the right fair for you:

Firstly, not all fair-failures are down to bad organising on the part of the fair.  Organisers of a well organised, good quality fair will have done everything they can within their means to make it a good event, and yet still you have a bad day. 

Very often, if you have a bad fair, it’s because you chose the wrong fair to do.  Don’t beat yourself up:  it takes experience to know which is the ‘right’ fair.  You have to have an idea of where your ideal customers are.  Even experienced stallholders sometimes pick the wrong fair.  The trick is to not do it twice!    Don’t throw you money away on fairs that don’t attract YOUR customers. 

Sometimes, no matter what the fair organisers do, however much hard work they put in and publicity they put out, the punters just don’t show up.  We can’t drag customers in against their will, and we can’t force them to spend their money.  And sometimes it’s the weather, and sometimes it’s the economy.  Retail is a tricky business.

The right fair for your products

  •  Does the fair only allow handmade/designed brands and products or are franchises and mass produced goods allowed?
  • If you decide to do a fair that isn’t just handmade, will your products be able to compete with franchises and mass produced goods on price/quality/appeal?
  • Is the fair part of a larger event with for instance children’s activities or live music, or a sporting event?
  • If you decide to do a fair that has other activities going on, will people be interested in buying handmade that day, or will they have spent up on donuts, candyfloss and rides? Does your product fit with the kind of event it is?
  • Do customers have to pay an entry fee or is it free entry?
    • There are pros and cons to both. If a fair has an entry fee, it can weed out the browsers and the “just came in to get out of the rain” people.  It can mean that you get people that are really keen to shop.  But it can also put people off, and you miss out on the casual/passing trade.  You have to judge whether the event has enough appeal for people to pay to enter.

 How to spot a well organised fair:

 Track record

  • What do other people say about it?
  • Was it well organised? Well marketed?
  • Was it well attended?
  • What kind of people attended?

Don’t go on the word of one person – ask around.  And remember that new fairs can’t have a track record, but you can get an idea of how well organised it is, by going through the rest of this checklist.

Good quality exhibitors/stalls

  • Are you asked for details about your work
  • Do you need to send photographs of your work
  • Do you need to send links to your website and social media
  • Are stalls allocated on a first come first serve basis or are they selected on quality and type of product?
  • Do they have rules about Copyrighted items? (Eg people who are using well known images on products)
  • Do you need to have Public Liability Insurance to sell at this fair?
  • Have they asked about legal compliancy for your particular product? (Eg CE marks for children’s toys and clothes, regulations for food, cosmetics etc)

What does this tell you?

  • If the answer to all these questions is yes, you know that the organisers are concerned with quality of the overall fair and individual stalls. They have given some thought to the brand and reputation of the fair itself.
    • PL Insurance – this means that the fair organisers are thinking about risk and responsibility, which is a good thing, and it might also mean they want to know how professional your business is.
  • If the answer to all these questions is no, then you can be sure that the organisers haven’t given much thought to the overall quality of the fair. You might get lucky and sell something, but chances are it’s not going to be great.

Marketing

  • Have the organisers stated what kind of marketing they do?
    • Most fairs require stallholders to do their bit to market it too. Have they stated what that is?
  • Are you able to tell from their previous events if they have done lots of marketing? (You can ask other people but you can also trawl their social media pages.)

Venue

  • Where is the venue?
  • Is it an event that people will travel to specially? Or does it rely on passing trade?
  • What is the demographic that is likely to visit? Is your ideal customer in that demographic?
  • What are the facilities at the venue?
    • Wifi/Toilets/Refreshments/Lighting/Heating? You might not need any of these, but a well organised fair should let you know ‘the lay of the land’.
    • Have the organisers told you how accessible the venue is (eg for wheelchair users, blue badge holders etc)
    • Have they told you whether it’s cold or damp?
    • Have they told you what the lighting is like?
  • Will the organisers be on hand for the duration of the fair to help with enquiries, sort problems and generally check all is well?

What does this tell you?

  • A well organised fair will have thought through all these issues from the perspective of the overall fair and from that of individual stallholders. They are interested in giving value for money to you the customer, and in the quality of their product, the fair as a whole.

Practical Arrangements

  • Have you been given a schedule for when information such as set up times, directions and so on, will be released?
  • Have you been given publicity materials?

Terms and Conditions:

Fair organisers should have set out their Terms and Conditions.   You are their customer, they are selling a service, and you need to know what you are getting.  Check that they have set T&Cs and that you are happy with the terms before handing over your money.

  • Does the fair have set Terms and Conditions?
  • What is included in your fee?
    • Table
    • Chair
    • Wifi
    • Access to a card machine
    • Any additional costs for provision of tables or lighting or processing your application
  • Do they state their cancellation/refund policy? Many fairs will allow a full refund if you cancel within a certain timeframe, but not if you cancel close to the event.  Is it clear what their policy is?
  • Do they say what is expected of you as a stallholder?
    • Setting up and packing up times?
    • Profanity etc – have they said whether and how you can display ‘adult’ themed products?
    • Display – have they any rules about how your display your products?
    • Do you have to give a percentage of your takings to the organiser? (sometimes this is in lieu of a fee – decide whether it offers Value For Money for you)
    • Are you required to donate stock – eg for a tombola? You should be told about this before hand, not just on the day, if it a condition of having a stall.
  • Copyright – does the fair have a policy on use of Copyrighted material?
    • Images such as Disney characters or graphics from comics or other work such as lyrics from songs are all copyrighted. Unless you have a license giving you express permission to use them in your products you are violating that copyright.   The owner of the copyright has the power to not only require you to stop trading, but also any event or store that is selling them.  A well organised fair should know this and have a policy on it.  (If you are unsure whether you are violating copyright, it is recommended you consult an Intellectual Property solicitor.)

And finally…

Think of fairs as a service like any other that you buy.  You wouldn’t go into a restaurant and hand over your money before knowing what you were going to get for your money.  The same should be true of fairs.  You need to choose the right fair for you and your work, and that is about knowing your business and your customers.  But you also need to make sure you are getting the service and the product you want.  The more people ask the questions, the more fairs will have to start offering a better product.

Download our PDF checklist here:

How To Choose A Good Fair

how to choose a good fair

Be Dispensable: the first rule of fair management

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By Becky Moore

As some of you know, I’m not just a fair organiser, I’m also a designer-maker myself.  I think that gives me an insight into what our stallholders need and expect from fairs.  They’re looking for a well publicised, well organised, well attended platform from which to sell their products.  It sounds like an easy formula, but it isn’t, as anyone who’s organised a public event can testify.  It takes experience and planning, lists and calendars and more lists, and data bases, and systems, and schedules, and yes, more lists!  And on the day it takes a good deal of people skills, quick thinking, problem solving and negotiation to pull it off and keep everyone happy.

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I recently applied for a stall at a prestigious event.  The application process was a little shaky, mistakes were made at their end that led to a fair few very vocal complaints.  (Also I didn’t get in, but that’s the way these things go, you can’t always get what you want.)  I wrote to the organiser accepting her apology and thanking her for her hard work.  Mistakes happen.  It reminded me just how big a job organising an event is.  I love it, I really do, and I’m good at it.  But sometimes the unforeseen happens.  Sometimes things go wrong.  Sometimes events organisers even seem like they’re just fragile human beings!

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I’ve been doing this sort of thing since I was 16 – organising people and events.  I wasn’t terribly good at it back then, but the intervening 4 decades have taught me a thing or two, and now I think I’m ok at it.  Sometimes I worry too much and get in a flap, (my partner thinks I’m too nice to my stallholders, I think I’m good at customer relations!)  but generally things run smoothly.  Those (nearly) 40 years have taught me how to anticipate problems and head them off at the pass.

But so much of it relies on “me”.  If you run your own micro-business, you’ll know just how much stuff you do that no-one, that’s NO-ONE with capitals – can do.  It has to be you.  It’s all in your head, it’s all about your mind, your soul.  So what happens when you just can’t be there?  What happens when – as I did earlier this month – you trip and fall and smash your face into a tarmac road and end up in A&E with a fractured nose and a bust up lip requiring stitches and you can hardly talk and look like you’ve been in a brawl?  The day before an event?  Yikes!

Well, what I did, was lie on a gurney in A&E and issue instructions on how to run an event, with bullet points and a schedule,  to my son.  Now, he’s helped me set up fairs before, and he’s stood on stalls with me many times, and as one of the chefs at the venue, he knows the place well, but he’s not an event organiser.  He hasn’t got 38 years of experience of managing conferences and festivals and fairs  and shepherding humans.  But there I am, whimpering in pain, covered in blood, and  he’s all I’ve got.

Turns out that all I’ve got is a pretty damn good substitution.  Saturday morning comes and as I lie in bed munching on various forms of analgesic and drinking through a straw, I get messages from various stallholders telling me everything is set up properly and my son is doing a grand job.  Such a grand job in fact that I’m wondering whether I can get away with staying in bed on the mornings of every fair!  (Preferably without having to drink tea through a straw though).

Yoojoo's stall at Design@HEART

Obviously he couldn’t have done it without the help of the venue staff, one of whom is also my partner (full disclosure here!), and also without my impeccable planning.  It’s those 38 years.  See, even though Design@HEART is a micro-business that relies on, and is, essentially ME, and even though I’m … erm … a control freak, the first rule of good events management is “organise yourself out of a job”.  Never be indispensable.