Surtex Debut

This May marked my debut as a surface textile designer at Surtex in NYC.  It was a solid six months of planning, creating, marketing and spending to get ready but it was worth it.  The greatest time went into developing my illustrations into formats that manufacturers could envision using on their products.  That required trying them in patterns, borders, different color palettes and formats. Those designs were put in a portfolio and on a slideshow format on my laptop.

The second biggest project was designing an 8x10' booth to draw people in.  Many people show their work in groupings or collections on the walls.  I took a different route and took some of my images and blew them up huge on 3 x 6' banners. It had impact without looking too busy.  Plus it was pretty easy to roll up and check as a bag at the airport.  I also brought one of my Solomon Seal rugs and a variety of my cards.

The variety of manufacturers who stopped by to talk included wallcovering companies, retail print companies, dinnerware and fabric companies, scrapbooking, online photo album companies and a few were international manufacturers including Belgium and Brazil.  I felt it was a good solid showing for my first time and felt validated in my decision to go.  I've been busy following up with the people I met and am on my way to securing my first license with one of the manufacturers.

I also met great exhibitors like Kathy Weller next door to me who took this photo and got to see some of my favorites like Kate Spain. Surtex was the right place to be and I believe my work will make it's way into the retail arena very soon.

Duane Boom, Glass Artist

I have to share the talented craftsman work by Glass Artist Duane Boom of Minneapolis. He was at Master Framers Art Crawl last weekend where we shared a space, so I talked to him about his work.  He started over 30 years ago with Tiffany lampshades like the one in the photo.  The colors and glass are true to the originals and are spectacular. I particularly like the Dragonfly one I found on his website and others I saw at the Gabberts Event he showed at in March.

Then seven years ago he took fused glass classes from different artists from around the country.  A sample is the rectangular form below.  He stacked pieces of glass in a box like pixie sticks in the kiln and fired them to create a slab of glass. He sliced it with a saw and ends up with these one of a kind repeated designs that are wonderful. He ends up firing each piece about 3 times. He's been using the patterned glass for unique necklaces, too. Duane also does leaded glass, unique glass buttons and wine stoppers.  A talented Arts & Crafts artist!


You can see Duane's work at the LoLa Show in Minneapolis: http://lolaartcrawl.com/
He is also showing at the Chicago Arts & Crafts Event : http://www.artsandcraftschicago.com/
and check his website:  http://www.boomglassart.com/
and Etsy shop: http://www.etsy.com/shop/BoomGlassArt