SWAG: Win A Super Coveted “Got Craft?” Swag Bag In Advance Of Sunday’s Craftiness

The first 45 people through the doors at Got Craft this Sunday will receive a FREE limited edition, hand-printed Got Craft tote bag stuffed with goods from Got Craft’s many vendors. As far as Swag bags go, this is a prime score. And don’t think it’s going to come easy. Word is that there are people planning to come great distances at ungodly hours in order to make sure that they are one of those first 45. Not sure if you’re made of the stuff it will take to be first to the scene? Don’t worry, there’s one other way to hook up. We have one of the coveted swag bags to give away to a lucky reader who jumps through the following hoops…

1) Like us on Facebook if you haven’t already.
2) Follow @scoutmagazine on Twitter and retweet the following: “I’m fixing to win a Got Craft? swag bag via @scoutmagazine http://wp.me/plxHU-d7n
3) Tell us which Got Craft vendor you will make a b-line for once you are through the doors at the Commercial Drive Legion this Sunday in the comments below. The winner will be chosen at random on Saturday.

Got Craft? | Sunday, May 6 | 10am – 5pm | Royal Canadian Legion (2205 Commercial Drive) | $3

VANCOUVERITES: Talking Shop & Inspiration With “Camp + Quarry” Designer Sarah Rankin

Sarah Rankin is a West Coaster, a Jewelry and Landscape Designer, a dog owner, tree hugger, and a mess maker. Her jewelry line, Camp + Quarry,  is nature-inspired and made right here in Vancouver.  From hand-dyed organic textiles to raw crystal jewelry, each piece is designed to emphasize the unique qualities of the natural materials used. Travel, outdoor adventures, and daydreaming are essential components of the C + Q design process and finished scarves and jewelry will happily go anywhere year-round. Check out her Etsy shop here. Sarah is going to take part in Got Craft on May 6th, and since we couldn’t wait that long, we caught up with her to ask her a few pre-Got Craft questions about what she’s been up to…

Three things about Dunbar that make you want to live there: I love the proximity to Kits and the University Endowment Lands — the dog walking potential is endless. Mountain views and lots of parks and beautiful gardens. Room to grow: I finally have space for a studio and a garden.

What inspires you? I’m a landscape designer by day and find a lot of inspiration in the landscape work I do. Shapes, compositions, and colours in the landscape inspire me, as does being introduced to new techniques and materials for making things. Often it’s the raw form of a given stone that inspires me to seek it out for use in jewelry. The wooden jewelry that I make uses materials and technology that I originally learned how to use to make models in landscape architecture school.

Tell us about your favourite space to work: (IMAGE: sarah-studio.jpg) Now that I have a studio set up at home, that’s where I love to work. It has great natural light and a good set up with a workbench, storage, and peg board that lets me have much better access to materials that I use. I’d love to say it’s always clean or at the very least organized, but that is not the case.

Where do you enjoy shopping in Vancouver? Tell us about some of your favourite local haunts: I love spending a weekend day in Gastown. For food, I always find myself at Six Acres. I’m loving Oak + Fort these days for clothing. They use natural fibres and make affordable basics that are unique and super wearable. And for jewelry I am absolutely in love with the Arielle de Pinto pieces at One of a Few. Someday, I hope to have one of her bracelets or necklaces to call my own.

Is there a local designer that you admire? There are so many talented designers in Vancouver that it’s hard to name just one. I do have a small collection of Heyday Design porcelain pieces. I love the clean, minimalist look of the pieces and how Heyday’s aesthetic is translated from housewares right down to tiny jewelry pieces. They make really great gifts, too.

What is your favourite Camp + Quarry creation right now? Right now I’m making some new pieces that mix raw stones and brass. I have a particular necklace made with brass tubing and rutilated quartz points that I love making. Adding the brass really reinvented this piece and the rutilated quartz points are my favourite stone to work with, though they’re a bit rare and I usually have a very limited supply of them. Read more

VANCOUVERITES: On Inspiration And Bow Ties With “Belvedere” Designer Kari Bergrud

Nothing says Spring like a good craft fair and nothing says craft fair like Got Craft. It’s one of our favourite local and handmade indie highlights of the season; a room packed full of some of the coolest artists, designers and crafters in the city all selling their wares at affordable prices. We went browsing the event’s list of purveyors online and lo and behold, we came across a new name and concept: Belvedere. Curious (and hoping it wasn’t vodka), we dug a little deeper. It turned out to be a newish mens accessory line that we think you’ll love.

The gentlemen of Vancouver have long been looking for a line of mens apparel to help them look snappy. This is where Belvedere comes in. This classic collection of mens accessories is inspired by the gentlemen of the 1950′s as well as todays modern chap. Designs include ties, clip on bow ties, tie your own bow ties, suspenders, pocket combs including rules to being a gentleman, and tie clips made from vintage spoons and forks.

We got in touch with Belvedere owner Kari Bergrud to ask her about her ”Classy Goods for Classy Gents” collection…

Tell us about Belvedere. What got you going? I guess you could say that I am the new kid on the block. I have only been at this haberdasher thing for just over a year now. It began because I had some friends that were in the crafting world and they encouraged me to make some of my hobbies into a business. I started with jewelry (button earrings and bicycle inner tube earrings to be exact) but I just wasn’t feeling it. I’m a seamstress at heart, but I did still love accessories. So I thought to myself, “Self, what can I sew that is an accessory that would make people happy?” The answer was clear: ties.

Three things about Commercial Drive that make you want to live there: I’m sure that this list could go on for a while but I will try to limit myself. I love that it is a big mishmash of different kinds of people from every walk of life and that people say good morning to you when you walk down the street (or if they don’t say it to me I can say at least say it to them without seeming crazy for talking to strangers). I love the local markets (farmers and crafts) and I love that I am constantly surrounded by amazingly talented artists that have made and are continuing to make Vancouver a special place to be.

What inspires you? Being around creative people is a huge inspiration for me.  I am challenged to keep my mind moving and it motivates me to get things done.

Tell us about your favourite space to work: A couple of years ago my mom gave me our family’s dining room table. It was made when furniture was heavy and ornate. When I put in all the leaves and spread out all of my supplies, that is when I am in my glory!

Where do you enjoy shopping and eating in Vancouver? One of my favorite places to hit up for dinner is Nicli Antica Pizzeria on East Cordova. The pizza is top notch and the wine list is superb. For late night drinks, Bao Bei Chinese Brasserie on Keefer is definitely top of my list. As for the stores that I find most of my treasures in, I head to Main and 3rd. There are two antique shops that are right beside each other: Space Lab and Re Find. At Space Lab I find a lot of the hardware and deco that I use for Belvedere. Re Find is more of a guilty pleasure for the part of me that thinks that I was actually born in the 1950s and 1960s.  For clothes I generally head over to the classic Value Village where I find things that I can take apart and put back together again.

Is there a local designer that you admire? Someone that I admire [who] just happens to be one of my dear friends is Zach Bulick. He is also the designer of all of my graphics for Belvedere. I am fortunate enough to also work along side him at Union Gospel Mission where he is the in house graphic designer. Being around Zach is like watching “So you think you can dance” when they are crumping (maybe this is just me). You feel like after they have preformed that you could do that, too. Tragically, the gift is not always there but nonetheless you are inspired to move and make things happen. Zach is constantly making things happen and building up people in his everyday life. He makes me want to be a better artist. I would encourage everyone to look him up and get a glimpse into this creative heart that is Zach Bulick. Read more

Say Hi To Courtney Johnston of Vancouver’s “Telly Design”

With the GotCraft? show coming up, we’ve gotten in touch with a few of the local artists prepping their work for show at the annual indie craft fair. Today we hear from Courtney Johnston of Telly Design. Telly, based in Vancouver in a studio that Courtney built for herself in a corner of her home, is known for understated and elegant designs that hold wide appeal. Get to know Courtney of Telly Design below and visit her table at GotCraft? this May 2nd.

Scout Q&A

Three things about your neighbourhood that make you want to live there: I live in Kitsilano, the lovely village by the beach. There is much to love about this part of Vancouver: the beach! A great place to hang out, swim, run, people watch and bbq on sunny Sunday afternoons.  A lot of my friends have settled in Kits and it’s an easy place to meet new friends too (super handy if you run out of gin). I walk and bike everywhere (my car gets dusty). Oh, and the restaurants! We have some good, diverse eats in Kits like Refuel, Maenam, Abigail’s Party, the burrito bar at Capers and my favourite, La Quercia. Read more

Got Craft! Interview: Beyond The Felted Magic Of Hold Handmade

GotCraft! approaches. The annual gathering of local artisans selling the latest of their handmade designs goes down at the Royal Canadian Legion (Commercial and 6th) on Sunday, May 2nd. As sponsors of this much-loved community event for the second time running, Scout tracked down a few of the exhibiting artists and asked them a few questions. We begin with Maria Roth of Hold: Modern Crochet Goods.

Maria’s current work focuses on crocheted, felted wool bowls and runners, as well as painted panel studies of indigenous plants. She learned how to crochet from her mother, who made and sold her own baskets in the 1970′s, and by watching her 99 year old grandmother make countless pairs of pom-pommed slippers, baby afghans and lace wedding bedspreads. Say hi after the jump… Read more

Because MALL is a 4 letter word

Don’t take your money to the mall this weekend and forget driving downtown where you have to shell out for underground parking. Instead, walk, bike, or take the skytrain over to Sixth and Commercial to take in the Got Craft show. Read more

Indie Profile: Melissa Pavlovic & The Beauty Of Poodlebreath

At Scout we are inspired by people who create. We recently scouted ceramic artist and jewelry designer Melissa Pavlovic (who will be showing her work at Got Craft in a few short weeks from now) and we tracked her down to ask her a few questions. Read more

Cool Hunting At Got Craft

We made a trip to the Got Craft Sale on Commercial Drive yesterday. Approaching the venue (Royal Canadian Legion), I was bummed out to see a line up. Normally, this wouldn’t be a big deal, but on this day the length of the line was made daunting because I was traveling with three males (two kids and one husband), all of whom I had assured that this would be a short stop. Thankfully, the line moved at a comfortable pace and we were in the middle of craft sale mayhem before we would have been able to finish the coffee we didn’t get (the line up for coffee anywhere along the Drive on this sunny Sunday afternoon was even longer that the craft fair queue). But I digress. The point of this post is to alert you to some of the great, inexpensive, locally made gift ideas gathered at the Got Craft show.

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The first booth I stopped at was District Thirty. The table was uncluttered had a clam sort of aura that attracted me immediately. The clean lines cut in to District Thirty sterling sliver pendants are exactly the kind of Jewellery that I love. Everything was handmade, hand carved and hand finished. Price tags ($48-$58) might not qualify as ‘cheap’ but considering the craftsmanship and modern look of the pieces, money well spent. Have a look at the District Thirty Etsy shop or pop in to Dream, Local designer boutique at 311 W Cordova.

Sam Bradd is seriously talented. This is a guy who, among other things, draws, binds books, and prints posters, tea towels and carry bags. I was most impressed with his ‘Eat Local’ tea towels ($15). The “Hope” posters were nice too. Anything in his Eat Local ‘line’ would be a great Christmas gift.

Before I could squeeze my way through the crowd to see what was on display at her table, I was struck by the upbeat energy of jewellery designer Nicole Tirona. She was bobbing up and down – proudly chattering to the crowd about her inspired jewellery. On the table: earrings and pendants with a funky vintage feel handmade by the evervecent designer. Have a look at her work here. Again, $40 – $60 range.

I am a sucker for paper and I couldn’t resist picking up a few cards from Jeannette Ordas of The Beautiful Project. Not only does this woman have an enviable sense of style, she has a sense of humour that is sure to tickle even the tightest person on your Christmas list. The beautiful project is available on line and in person at Paper-Ya.

On a second sweep around the room I came across Little Red Caboose. Brightly coloured matryoshka dolls, mom and kid scarves, and felt crowns were well crafted with natural fabrics and fibres. Truly beautiful stuff.

The most exciting find of the afternoon was Kohana Jewellery. Kathy Milot had the greatest postage stamp and map pendants. The map pendants were a big hit with us. Made by placing small bits of maps from an outdated French atlas under a glass bead – the idea was so simple. Pendants were between $10 and $12 and earrings were $16.Her reasonable prices made it all the more easy to hand over the cash. We were taken by a pair of earings, a New York pendant for a friend and a Venice pendant for my six year old son and I to share. If you have a soft spot for a city or place and don’t see a pendant, don’t fret, the artist will do a custom job for you. An excellent gift idea.

Ever wonder why a tea cozy always has to look like it was designed by Holly Hobby and made in China? I have too. I drink tea. I would love a tea cozy. But every tea cozy I have ever seen has been sinfully ugly. That is until now. The Owl and Pussycat tea cozy is a testamant to the fact that taste and simplicity can be manifest in something as mundane as a tea cozy. But Owl and Pussycat doesn’t stop at little hats for your tea pot. They also have incredibly awesome-looking bibs ($15). Thank gawd someone out there is tuned in to the fact that it is the grown-up feeding the kid who is forced to stare at the parade of cartoon characters marching across the pastel background of the traditional bib. The kid can’t see the bib. The kid doesn’t wash the bib. The kid doesn’t scrape mushy bits from the bib. Making the fabric of a bib more aesthetically pleasing to we who must deal with the goopy stuff is a welcome advancement in the world of bib design – and all you have to fork over is $15. Deal!

Twice in one day? It was too good to believe. But it was true: Stitchella also had a hip tea cozy. Other items at this fresh looking carft booth included lavender-filled cotton eye pillows, pencil cases (quite easily used as a makeup bag, digital camera case, or a small tote instead of lugging along your regular purse), great little coffee cup sleaves (I bought one) and ipod nano cases (who buys nanos?). All items (tea cozy and eye pillow aside) appeared to have been made of wool and were adorned with a single crow, sparrow or bicycle print.

On the stage at the back of the room I was thrilled to come across the Billy Would booth. Great, familiar stuff.

And that was it. Down the stairs we went, unfurling our stashed stroller and back into the wilds, our pockets filled with cool gifts made right here.