SoWa Holiday Market show

 

Come by and visit Swirly Designs this weekend and support creative makers. 

We will be at the SoWa Holiday Market 

41 Berkeley Street, Boston, MA  SAT & SUN

Merry Christmas!

Our First Reading Fall Street Faire

Hello Friends! Swirly participated in our first Fall Street Faire in our hometown a few weeks ago.

We visit the event every year with the kids and always left saying "Gee, next year we should get a booth and give it a try". Well, things happen and we always seem forget to register. :-(

This year, however, we remembered! And we're glad we did. The weather was sunny and pleasant, which brought in the crowds. The event organizer estimated approx 10,000 people visited this one day event, choc full of local businesses. Having two kids in the school system here, we were visited by many of our school friends, parents, teachers and neighbors. It was funny that they were all kind of surprised and a little puzzled to actually see what we make and do for a living. I guess we aren't the heaviest self promoters of what we do when socializing with our community.

Crowds of people roam the streets visiting and supporting the community.

Our booth is all set up and ready. (It was quite windy that day, so our table cloths were blowing)

Our two Swirly Helpers manning the booth.

A framed process helps explain what polymer clay is and how we make our Swirlies.

All and all it was a fun day. Having our kids join us for a large part of the day helping pass out business cards was great. And when the event was over and the car was packed up it was especially nice to know we were only a 5 minute car ride home!

Remember to Shop Local and Buy Handmade!

SoWa Holiday Market 2012

 

The holidays have come and gone :(  But now that we have a little free time we can catch you up and share some of the fun things that happened this month. First one is the SoWa Holiday Market that was in early December. We have been doing this Holiday Market for many, many years and it has always been a home run for us.  The promoter does a wonderful job getting PR for this show and he always brings in the crowds.

The event was held in a new location this year–Benjamin Franklin Institute. This is always a little stressful not knowing if the new location is going to bring in the shoppers. We also had a smaller booth space which required us to rethink our booth layout.

We worked setting up  right up to the last minute when the doors opened early Saturday morning.

Excited so show off our new frosted tree display with our new collection of snowball snowman and Santa ornaments.

The response was very positive to our new designs and many of them found new homes this holiday.

We wished we had more time to take more pictures but we were pretty swamped from start to close both days.

Thanks to everyone who came to see us and all the wonderful artisains at this show and it's new location. 

Craft show LOVE!

Images from the our craft show at the Wellesley Marketplace Nov 17, 2012

Well we surivied our craft show over the weekend. Hooray!! We kicked off the start of our Craft show appearences this past Saturday and ending on Dec 8 and 9th at the SOWA holiday show. I know it doesn't seem like a lot shows, but for us these shows take a lot out of us. It seems like we are always scrambling up to the last minute, making sure we have everything we need and constantly second guessing every decision we make. We were working on only three hours of sleep and then we were on our feet for seven hours.

You might ask "Then why do you do it??" ... well the answers is so simple...
We do this because of YOU, our Swirly fans! You guys are the best! When those doors opened at 9am and the people came flowing in you always make sure your first stop is our booth. WOW! It   reassures us how truly blessed we are to be able to create what we love and have you treasure and enjoy them as much as we do. We loved hearing the stories from many of you on why you were buying an ornament. One woman was buying a patriotic ornament for her son-in-law who just became a US citizen and a Dad and his kids came by and let them each pick out a special ornament - it was great to see them choose an Easter and Halloween ornament! Someone even told us they drove two hours, then got lost, just to come see us. In the spirit of Thanksgiving this week, we just wanted to say THANK YOU for appreciating us and what we create here at Swirly.

Here are a few shots we were able to take during that crazy day for anyone who wasn't able to make it. Don't fret if you missed it, our Christmas collection we be launched online Monday, December 3rd.

Have a great Monday!

Holiday season wrap up!

As the Christmas craziness settles down here at the studio, we both can finally let out a BIG sigh of relief for getting all our holiday orders out in the mail and finishing up our last craft show for the season.

Both were a big success for Swirly. We had a record breaking first day sales on the Friday launch day of our Christmas collection. And the SOWA Holiday marketplace show last week had a line of people wrapped around the building waiting for hours just to shop the show.

We are so thrilled and happy people appreciate and look for handmade goods to celebrate the season. It is always nice to read the kind emails about our ornaments and being able to chat in person with everyone who stopped by our booth to see our swirly ornament designs. We thank you for that.

There was so much fun stuff we wanted to share with you this month but never had the time, so we hope to post a lot of them all this week.

Upcoming Craft show and our Holiday collection

We have taken what's left of our 2011 handmade Holiday ornament collection, so we will have something for our upcoming craft show: The 8th annual SOWA Holiday Market this coming Saturday Dec 10th 11-7 pm.

If there are anything designs left from the show we will post them on Monday.

Have a wonderful week.

Here is our vendor profile that was on the SOWA website a few weeks ago. If you live around the Boston area be sure to stop by this Saturday and say hi.

In the Studio: Embellishing ornaments for a Craft show

We have been busy busy busy working around the clock gearing up for our craft show this Saturday. There is still sooooo much more to do before Saturday. Today in the studio is all about adding embellishments to our ornaments with paper messages, 3-D paint, bells and lots and lots of GLITTER.

Enjoy the peek into the studio.


We have to set up extra tables around the studio so we can spread out the ornaments to dry.


A spool of wax twine works great for making bows and stringing paper messages on two of our new designs this season.


It's not Christmas around here without the return of Swirly the snowman. This year he is in tones of pinks and reds which was inspired by the color of candy canes.

For anyone who lives in the area and wants to check out the collection early, we will be doing our first Holiday craft show of the season, on Saturday November 19th at the Wellesley Marketplace, here in MA.

We are also going to try and Facebook book through out the day on Saturday about all the goings on of our craft show so make sure you stop by our Facebook page.

Have a good weekend!

In the Studio: Painting away...

Happy November everyone!

The October snow is finally melting away but the chilly air is here to stay. But it makes for a perfect setting to be painting away in the studio on our new Holiday collection for all of you to see very soon. We are planning to launch the collection soon after Thanksgiving.
Be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get your reminder emails.

And for anyone who lives in the area and wants to check out the collection early, we will be doing the first Holiday craft show of the season, on Saturday November 19th at the Wellesley Marketplace, here in MA.

Here is a little peek into a few designs we are working on....

Here we are in the very early painting stages of a jolly St. Nick design.


These fun cookie-inspired designs are new for us. We created a few for a cover of a Holiday magazine that we will share with you next week.

Have a great weekend!

Our 2010 Collection is SOLD OUT!

Hope to see everyone at our last Craft show of the season this weekend
DEC 11th & 12th at the
SOWA Holiday Market
for more information visit sowaholidaymarket.com

Busy little elves....

We are busy working away here in the studio in these last few weeks before our December 1st deadline.

Above are some shots of the work in process. These ornaments are waiting for a coat of varnish and glitter.

We do have to switch gears a bit this week though. This Saturday the 20th we have our first of two holiday craft shows. We're busy finishing up the ornaments and gathering all our stuff for the craft show.

Anyone who is in the Boston area, come and get an early sneak peek of this years Holiday collection this Saturday, at the 34th annual Wellesley Marketplace.

We hope too see you there!

Holiday Craft Show Schedule

We can't believe it's time for booking the upcoming Holiday craft shows again!
This is our first confirmed booking:
We will be at the 34th Annual Wellesley Marketplace again this year. We had a great time last year seeing all the variety of crafters showcasing their unique creations. We love seeing old friends at the show and meeting new ones.

This year it happens on Saturday November 20th 2010

Check out their website and mark your calendars and come visit us at the show, we'd love to see you again this Holiday season!
BOOTH #130 Upper Gym

Our last Craft show of the Season

On Dec 12th and 13th we did our last craft show of the season. We took a few shots that day and we wanted to take more but our camera battery died... figures.
Anyway, the SOWA Holiday Market is always a fun show for us. The promoters do an excellent job with advertising and picks a great mix of quality artisans. We highly recommend checking it out next year. The same promoter has other shows called SOWA Open Market that happen over the summer which we have heard good things about.

The crowds were filling up the entry way to stay warm on this very chilly Sat morning.

Setting up is always fun...NOT! No matter how many times we do a show we are always second guessing the best way and most effective way to layout our booth space. Placement of the tables, believe it or not, is very important on making a pleasant shopping experience.


Arranging our ornaments on the table, as well as hanging them on our trees helps our customers see the pieces at their best.

Our very popular Baby's First Christmas is always selling out. This year we did this ornament in tones of pinks for the show.

We enjoy doing craft show because you really get to see the reactions to certain designs and themes. One of the new designs we had this year was our new Mini Snowman Wind Catchers. People really enjoyed these guys. They could be making an appearance online next year - stay tuned!!



After two days and many shoppers later it was time to clean up and reflect on the show and start thinking of new ideas for next year.
Happy Holidays!

What goes into doing a craft show

With the arrival of our second child earlier this year we decided that we would have to cut back on doing craft shows.

With all the planning that goes into doing these shows and having to find someone to watch the kids for the whole weekend, is getting harder and harder to do.

We really love meeting all our collectors who come out year after year to see us and see our new designs. Hearing the feedback is priceless. We thought only a couple of shows this season could work.

This past weekend was the first of two shows we are doing (our next show is on Dec 12th & 13th the SOWA Holiday Market).

We thought it would be fun to share with everyone what goes into doing a holiday craft show.

First choosing which show to participate in is probably the most challenging part for us. The booking for a show starts early in the year so you really have to have your game plan ready right after you finish the current season of shows. This always is difficult for us! We need to decide which shows to do again and then look into trying to submit to new ones. But with so many shows around we like to try to visit a show first to see if it's a good fit for our designs, sometimes that's not always possible.

Displays and space planningOnce you get that acceptance letter the planning begins!
There is a lot we take into consideration when doing a show. We want our booth to be an “experience” for the shoppers. Things you may not notice, but we do...like table heights. How high is best for viewing. Also, how they are the tables positioned to invite the customer “into” our space.

Displays:
We like to use a variety of trees to showcase our ornaments. We have to think about how many to bring. As designers we take pride in clear and readable signage. We also like to have a backdrop so the shopper doesn't get distracted by the surrounding booths. Lighting is something else we need to think about. It usually is an extra expense but if we feel that the location is going to be dark we have to splurge. We also have to think think about flooring, packing materials, postcards, extra ornament tags, credit card machine and so much more. You also have to calculate how much product to take to a show. And lastly make sure everything will fit in your car and that it is easy to assemble in a timely manner.


For this particular show it was a one day show. The hours were 9-4. Set-up began at 6:30 am. We were up late the night before till 3 am trying to get everything together and we were still rushing up to the last moment tagging and pricing the ornaments. It seems we always bring more than we need. You never can tell which designs people are going to prefer. We do find it interesting that ornaments from other seasons, like Halloween and Easter, do well at the shows.


We created this framed process display a few years back after repeating and repeating to everyone who entered our booth how we go about creating our work. Now this visual shows what goes into making a swirly design without hearing our annoying voices repeat it over and over for 8 hours.


The best part of standing on your feet for 8 hours straight... is meeting all the customers and collectors who come back each year looking for our new designs. We had one customer drive 2 hours just to see us! It so important for us to meet our audience and get that feedback.

The show was a success for us we think doing these smaller shows will work. They are not as crazy as a three day show and we think it still important for us to shows to keep Swirly Designs name out there especially around the holidays.

Which craft shows do you like to attend and why?

SOWA Holiday Market is coming!

We can't believe it's time for the SOWA Holiday Market again! This is our fifth year doing it and just love it. It has a great variety of crafters showcasing their unique creations. We love seeing old friends at the show and meeting new ones.

This year it happens on Dec 12-13 at the Cathedral High School in the South End.

Check out their website and mark your calendars and come visit us at the show, we'd love to see you!

Craft Schedule Update

With the Holiday Craft Show season fast approaching we thought we'd post an update on where you can find us. And we're very excited to announce that we are doing our first in-store trunk show this November. We'll give you more information on when and where in a later post. Meanwhile, if you are in the Boston area we hope to see you at one of the shows:

Wellesley Marketplace
Saturday, November 21, 2009 / 9-4pm
at the Wellesley Middle School

Sowa Holiday Market
Saturday, December 12, 2009/ 10am - 6pm Sunday, December 13, 2009 / 10am - 6pm
at the Cathedral High School Gym, 74 Union Park Street (on the corner of Washington Street)
In Boston's South End

Upcoming Craft Shows

We decided this year to cut back on the number of craft shows we exhibit at. We feel really bad because doing the craft shows are one of the only few times we actually get a chance to meet and greet all our customers of Swirly Designs. We absolutely love meeting everyone and chit chatting! So, as soon as we get confirmation on the few shows that we are doing, we will let you know.







This first booking that came in last week is:
Wellesley Marketplace at the Wellesley Middle School
on Saturday, November 21, 2009 9-4 pm

See you there!

Challenging Times

We are in complete and utter shock to hear that Hallmark Magazine has ended it's publication with the Feb/Mar issue.

This is what was posted on their site:


We know the economy is bad.... but with all these magazines dropping like flies, we feel they must of had problems long before. What is really unsettling for us as a small business is that we rely on these creative magazines to market our product. (And don't get us wrong, we know with the ceasing of all these wonderful publications, hundreds of creative people are out of work and our hearts go out to them). Now we can see how this economy creates a chain reaction:

We are expecting our second baby in April, and we were discussing the idea that we would cut back on our show schedule and focus more on advertising. We had a lot of success with our past ads in MEHC magazine and it just seem to make more sense (we thought) if we can just advertise and stay in the studio working rather then spending every weekend during the busy holiday season at the craft shows.

What's making us a little worried is that with magazines, the ads need to be booked months in advance as do the craft shows. Say we booked a few ads for the upcoming holiday season and the magazine goes under, we'll have no ads AND all this merchandise... plus we missed out on the crafts show deadlines.

So far, two of our top magazines we decided to advertise with have ended without warning.
Just this week Hallmark magazine called the studio about advertising in the April/May issue and I told them we weren't able to make that ad deadline but we were definitely going to book the Sept/Oct and the Nov/Dec issue. I asked the sales rep how the magazine was doing and she was raving about the magazine and said because Hallmark is huge company with such a large following they weren't going anywhere. Well I guess we really need to rethink our marketing plans so we don't become the next casualty.

We hope that the coming year brings positive change for everyone in a tight spot, no matter what you do for work. Our hearts go out to all our fellow crafters especially, who I'm sure are finding this year to be one of the most challenging. Good luck!

Our last craft show of the Season

Last weekend was the end of our craft show season for the year. The SOWA Holiday Market is wonderful show full of really cool artisans with a dedicated promoter who does a great job getting the crowds to show up (especially with the challenge we are all facing economically).
We were planning on bringing our camera to take lots of pictures of the weekend, but silly us we forgot it both days! Thanks to Lianne and her trusty Apple iPhone, she was able to save the day.

the space we have for this show was a lot smaller than
the Christmas festival. On the plus side though, we did have a corner space.


We try not to go over board with our display. We realize with a more elaborate design, it's not fun taking down the display at the end of the show!

The crowd came out over this chilly weekend to buy some unique gifts. This is one of the few shows where we actually try hard to make the time to walk around the show because you can find some wonderful things for the holidays... but we usually just shop for ourselves.
Here are a few items we picked up.


We always purchase these yummy sauces from Shootflying Hill Sauce Co. (we love the butterscotch) They are handmade in small batches using natural ingredients that you will easily recognize. We met Cory, the founder, a few years back at another show. We always make time to chat at the shows. She is a sweet person, just like her sauces.

The booth beside us was a letterpress company called B Designs Inc. Once we saw these cute letterpress Santa tags we just had to have them. They got a real kick out of us when we told them that we had to get two sets... one to keep and one to use. These tags are just too cute to use.



Speaking of cute.... Sew Cuties are a fun collection of handmade critters in fabulous fabrics with lots of charm. Part of the fun in doing these show for us, is getting a chance to network and meet some very colorful characters and Cathy from Sew Cuties is a perfect example. Her personality is as fun and colorful as her designs. We purchased some of her bird ornaments last year for our nieces and this year we had to get her new baby blanket design (which we got early thank goodness because they went fast!) for our new baby girl who is coming in April 09.

This is just a little taste of what went on this weekend. If you haven't been to a craft show lately make a point to visit one or two next year and support and meet your local artisans.