Craft fair with a soundtrack
At Raleigh's Rock & Shop Market, local bands serenade shoppers and rack up on loot
By Beth Tacular
Published: July 20th, 2007 | 8:00am
When my band, Bowerbirds, was asked to play at the Rock & Shop Market this June - an event that combines a DIY market with sets by local bands and DJs, it took me all of three seconds to say, "Hell yes." Music and crafts are two of my favorite things, and I knew that playing the show was a surefire way to rope my boyfriend (and bandmate), Phil, into craft shopping with me. Here are some of the crafty designs I liked best...
Mi Scusi
As soon as I saw Andrea Iiacobucci's adorable homemade and reworked vintage and modern clothing, I began obsessing over it. I spent half an hour at her rack, holding things up to myself and trying to decide what to buy. I ended up with a perfect sweater, which both my bandmates thought was hot. The color combinations and shapes in her clothes were really interesting and beautiful, and everything was soft and looked comfortable.
Andrea also was selling embroidered vinyl jewelry and tiny bird dangly earrings. It was down to the wire over whether I'd be leaving with stitched-diamonds-on-teal-vinyl dangly earrings or the sweater. The sweater won by a fraction of an inch. The diamond earrings will have to wait for my birthday. And, she was selling some very soft hand-knitted hats and scarves, on which I'll have to stock up, come winter. Did I mention her things were soft?
Creativ Bee
I really liked these polymer bird and deer necklaces on gold chains. Ms. Bee also made hand-dyed silk scarves, some of which had skulls on them, for people who want to look debonaire while zipping along on their scooters or in their convertibles, as well as pretty earrings and stationery.
Photo Glass Works
Tracy of Photo Glass Works uses found art, and art mde by her artist friends, to construct these serene, but vaguely eerie, glass and wire necklaces.
Back in the day, she used to work with stained glass, until she got pregnant and so quit to avoid the fumes from the soldering compound. Now she's being healthier, while the world is getting more unique jewelry. It's a perfect arrangement. My favorite pendants featured vultures circling amongst winter trees.
Iro Handbags
Kimonos are neat! These handbags, all made from vintage Kimono fabric, are really well made, with a lot of attention to detail, and they would go great with one of your fancier outfits.
It's fun to imagine that your purse was once elegantly wrapped around someone in Japan, long ago. I want one for when I go out to eat sushi.
K-popp
It's hard to describe how great K-popp's soaps, lotions, perfume oils and other homemade luxuries smelled, but I wanted to eat or lick all of them. It's rare that I find scented body care products that are both subtle and earthy enough for my liking, but I would have gleefully jumped into a baby pool filled with any one of the dozens of items K-popp had for sale. If you like scents like vetiver, vanilla, lavender, sandalwood, lemongrass, or coconut, these soaps are for you. Or if you like the taste of Vietnamese and Thai food, you'll love her perfumes - for some reason these scents reminded me of the feeling I get from eating Thai food... they were fresh and clean, while being simultaneously sexy. K-popp also makes a sweet soap for your canine friends.
Made by Tess
Tess's style reminded me of Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz meets Betty Crocker, with her technicolor aprons, bags and pincushions. If you look closely at this apron, it starts to vibrate. It would probably be neat to look at it through 3-D glasses.
Tess's aprons would be the perfect thing to wear while making cupcakes for your friends.
Sarah Holsapple
Sarah wins the prize for best last name and cutest chimpanzee onesies. Her young son was wearing one of her little tee shirts, with a VW bug on it, and seemed to be enjoying the rock music. He was the most fashionable kid in the place.
I asked him if he liked getting to wear cool clothes, because of his mom being a designer and all. He said yes.
Rock, Paper, Scissors
More cute clothes for kids. I'm really glad there seems to be a trend in DIY folks making genuinely cute toddler clothes, because one walk through the baby aisle at any chain store, with all the pink and purple flowery bonnets and frilly dresses, makes me want to slit my wrists. If I ever have kids, they are gonna be wearing owls-on-bicycles shirts, made by a designer like Rock, Paper, Scissors, who hand-draws and then screenprints in nice colors on organic fabric. The walruses-in-love shirts and onesies would also do just fine.
Pear Threads
This bag reminds me of the book, Fruits, the Japanese street fashion coffee table book. I think it's the crazy combination of patterned fabrics, and the tiny vintage pin on the bottom left. All the things at her booth were really high quality, from the colorful vinyl diaper bags and laptop cases, to the stretchy headbands and skirts. Someone mean person bought the stretchy skirt I wanted before I could come back with my money.
Pillow Book
Lisa Valvo of Pillow Book takes old, discarded objects, and recycles them into really cool things, like these beer bottle citronella candles, perfect for your next cookout, pool party, or backyard fiesta.
I'm thinking Lisa must be able to convince herself that drinking beer is part of her "art," an important part of gathering craft materials, which is a pretty good excuse for vice and debauchery, if you ask me. I'll have to start making hair ribbons out of chocolate wrappers, to justify my habit. Thanks for the inspiration, Lisa.
Lisa was also selling sweet checkbook covers and wallets she made out of old magazines and product packaging.
Plastic Flame Press
The couple who comprise Plastic Flame are the main poster-makers for shows at the Cat's Cradle, the Triangle's biggest local venue for indie music. They were selling really amazing screen prints of posters for these shows, as well as other art prints, and screen printed kids' clothes, with dinosaurs on them. They also make posters for other band shows not at the Cradle, and for our CD release party this summer at 305 South, they made us one of the best posters we've ever had.
Sew Bliss Sew
Bliss makes a lot of cool stuff out of mostly vintage fabric, including the wide high-waisted belts you see at the left of this photo. She also stitches together really unique clothes for men, women and babies.
I got a lovely jellyfish onesie from this table. I liked the idea of putting a dangerous creature right on the belly of a baby, instead of a gentle baby deer, or a hen with chicks, or something similarly benign. I like babies to look ballsy, or eggsy if they're girls.
Sandra McEwen
Sandra was selling really nice handmade silver jewelry, and also enameled necklaces and earrings, mostly with a bird theme. I'm a sucker for anything with wings, as you've probably gathered by this point, and this shiny necklace glistened from across the room, and like a siren, lured my lost ship over to the island of her table, at which point it became hard to leave. She also had some cool silver feather dangling earrings.
Lost Woods Print
The tee shirt I bought for Phil came from Lost Woods. Each of this artistic man's fantastic shirts is one of a kind, and screenprinted in crazy colors with his special designs. These guys, at left, seem to be hair models from the sixties, who have the usual rainbows across their eyes. Of course they do.
My friend Casey Porn bought one of his creepy cat shirts. Lost Woods was definitely a hot spot with shoppers at the Rock & Shop Market, as it should have been. Shit was good enough to hang on your wall, let alone wear on your body.
But Phil's shirt fits perfectly, so he's planning on wearing it.
Issue #35
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