Portland Saturday Market Experience - Week #1

I've waited 3 years to get into Portland Saturday Market and I finally got there. The reason it took me so long to get in is because my embroidery products need to be made by me. PSM is an artist market. A kind of farmers market without the farmers. Commercial products and items are not allowed. PSM is not a swap meet. You won't find the $2 made in china items there. It is all hand crafted by the artist standing right in front of you.

PortlandSaturdayMarket.com

 We finally made it to our first weekend at Portland Saturday Market last weekend.  We didn't sell anything but we didn't really expect to. We thought if we did sell something it would be a bonus. Our first weekend was more for a learning process then anything else. We found that PSM is the community that we are looking for. They are a friendly bunch of artist all willing to help out. We can't wait to get out there again. Hopefully, next time we will sell something. =)

What we learned is:

 #1 We need lighting. We sat in a dark cave all day. Our products are in the dark the customers can't see what we have to sell. It doesn't make it very inviting to come in and look.

 #2 Drapes or curtains make the space more appealing to customers.

 #3 With the wind we need weights on the legs to hold the tent down. The wind gust easily pick up the tents.

 #4 The labels on the products are too big. We need to re-do them.

 #5 Multi tier products. Displaying the products at different levels is more appealing then all at one level. 

 #6 We need another table. Two tables in the space with more items to display.

 #7 We need a hand cart for packing and unpacking our tent and products.

 #8 Product information or explanation. Customers didn't understand or know what the product was. 

 #9 Pricing! We both felt the pricing of the products might need to be addressed.

#10 Branding! We need to keep everything branded with the same company name. Website, email, etc...

#11 Accepting credit cards. We noticed a lot of the vendors use a card swipe on their cellphones from a company called thesquare.com

#12 Eventually we will want to buy a different tent. The one we have is hard to use. It uses push buttons on the legs which pinch your fingers. Buy a tent with the clamps, levers or snaps. They are much easier to use. 

Suggestion is hutshop.com. They sell the hard to find 8x8, 10x10 and other sizes. They also sell the walls, weights, banners etc...

#13 We need a company banner with the company name and spongy cord. 

#14 Always bring work to work on in your space. It draws customers in to see what you are doing.

#15 Layer your clothes in the cold months and a good rubber soled shoe. Don't wear regular tennis shoes because you can feel the cold from the cement.

#16 A heater if allowed. PSM allows propane heaters only.  These will help keep you warm on cold days.

We have a lot to do before we go back out there. Some stuff will get done, while others will have to wait for some other time.

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From Sketch to Embroidery - Iris

 

I designed the iris from a picture of an iris I drew when I was in high school. The drawing has been on my wall in every apartment I have ever lived in. I made the 3D version of my embroidery from the drawing. I am experimenting with ribbon in this photo for the leaves and stem. I really like how the above photo turned out.

 

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Cherry Blossoms Pillow

I used my cherry blossom design that I created a few years ago for this pillow. This is one of my first embroidery designs that I created. I was inspired by the cherry blossom trees in the neighborhood. Every year when Spring rolls around the cherry blossom trees bloom. By the end of May the air fills with pink and white petals as they float to the ground. It looks like it is snowing in shades of pink. 






This pillow uses two rows of pink ribbon running vertically dividing the pillow into sections. The cherry blossom design is embroidered onto the tan cotton pillow. I added single cherry blossoms to the top of the branches and floating them down the front to make it look as if they were falling off the tree. This technique creates a 3D effect with the cherry blossoms.

Cherry Blossom design is copyrighted.

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From Sketch to Embroidery. White Swan

White Swan is an embroidery that I recently designed. It was inspired by two things. One is Swarovski crystal company logo and the other a set of wedding champagne glasses with a swan etched into the glass.

This is my quick sketch of a swan I found in a pond by the restaurant we were eating at.

This is the completed White Swan design. I love how the wings came out against the fill flat stitch of the neck and tail.

White Swan is copyrighted material.

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Pink Eiffel Tower Pillow

I have spent all day working on finishing this pillow cover today. The Eiffel Tower was embroidered in black on pink fabric a few months ago. It was starting to become a UFO (unfinished object) that sat on top of a pile of stock towels glaring at me every time I entered the room. You could almost hear it saying finish me, pleassssse finish me. Today I decide to complete it. As I started the project I realized that it was cut out in with the old pillow pattern. I soon realized I needed to make modifications to it and this wasn't going to be as simple as I thought. In order to get the pattern to work right I ended up adding a black border around the outside to frame the Eiffel Tower. After many hours of playing with the borders I finally got it to fit together correctly. I am very pleased with how it turned out.

The Eiffel Tower is a very popular iconic image that is found in home decor. The color of pink is the popular color of a girls room. With this pillow cover I combined the pink fabric with the Eiffel Tower embroidered in black.

 

My pillow covers are offered in many sizes, 10x10, 12x12, 14x14, 16x16 and 18x18.

Eiffel Tower design is copyrighted. 

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