Inspirations

Beautiful things inspire me. But to me, beauty is all about creativity. Being able to put together different elements and make them look unique and amazing is a form of creativity. That is why I love accessories. When it comes to my own wardrobe, I must say they are pretty plain. I prefer to play up my clothes with accessories. I find versatility in accessorizing and that constantly makes me think of unique combinations with different objects and elements for my craftwork too. I really don't like to think of anything colour or object as boring or ugly. In fact I would prefer to find a way to make it work. That is the challenge I find in my craftwork.

I must say that working with brides-to-be from United States, Europe and other parts of the world over the last 2 years has been inspirational and wonderful. The fact that they love colours gave me alot more freedom to be creative. Never have I thought that a bride would want to match a royal purple with cream and black for her wedding pillow but one bride requested for that because those were her wedding colours. It turned out really well and she loved it! With the right design to it, everything turned out perfect! A recent bride had Fushia pink and charcoal grey as her wedding colours and it really challenged me to come up with a ring pillow that made her day! She was thrilled when I sent her the completed pillow.

Being able to satisify my customers from a 1000 miles away merely through a few emails is just awesome. How can I not love my job? ;)

I love Shoe Clips

I am recently working on a new product line for Precious Findings. They are none other then the most amazing invention of all time, SHOE CLIPS. Like most women, I love shoes. But there only that amount of space for me to keep my shoes and being a stay home mom, I have less opportunities to wear them. I realised that I am always wearing those few most comfortable pairs of shoes and the rest are still in the shoe closet and soon  they will disintegrate. As such, eventhough I love them so much, I restrain my buying. Instead I thought shoe clips are just perfect for me. In fact I thought they should be perfect for most ladies out there.

There are so many ways to wear our one pair of plain shoes.The shoe clip can do wonders! It can be clipped in different ways on the shoes to give a different look each time, e,g, in the middle, slightly off centre, near the ankle. While you wear a plain pair of black pumps to work in the day, you may just put on the shoes clips in the evening and you are ready for a more formal  or fun occasion in the evening.

Look out for more of my creations coming your way at www.precioufindings.etsy.com or you may contact me directly.

Product shoots with young children

I finally had a chance to photograph my most adorable niece, Grace, with my Pixie Suzie collection. Having a model is really important for some products such as hair accessories and clothing, especially for online businesses because consumers want to see how your product will look when they put them on. They may not be able to visualise very well if there isn't a model. I knew I needed that for Pixie Suzie and that I know is the toughest part. I am never a superb photographer myself and neither is my hubby. Shooting the products on their own its pretty easy but when it comes to putting them on a model and when it is a child model, it becomes extremely tricky.

Grace is such a sweet little 2 year old but being a toddler her attention span is naturally short and they can't quite take instructions yet. So I knew we had to take candid shots of her while she was playing. We took loads of it but only a handful turned out ok. Thanks to Picasa, a free photo editing software, we managed to put together a fairly decent collage of all the better pictures after loads of adjustments. We definitely need more practice :)

Pricing My Handmades

Pricing is always one of the most tricky things in any business. I used to be clueless about pricing and tended to price without including my man-hours which should cover design time and the actual crafting time. Then again, I asked myself how am I going to price myself. How much does my time worth?

In order to decide on that, I had to access the amount of effort I had to put into the creative process for each piece of work, the amount of detailed work, the level of skill involve in each design. With these in mind plus the material costs, that is how I am going to price my crafts. Then again, I had to also access my competitors. What is the average market price for similar crafts and designs? With that I can more accurately rate my crafts.

Eternal Covenant US$42.00 
This Italian corded lace ring pillow lined with baby pink satin was customized for a local customer. She was very pleased and she dropped a feedback on my Etsy store that says " I absolutely love my ring pillow and am sooo glad I found Karen's etsy store! She is extremely patient with all my questions and even delivered the pillow to my house (we both live in Singapore)! Pillow was beautifully packaged, simply worth every cent! Thanks Karen!! :) I will definitely send you pictures of the ring pillow in action next year...stay tuned! :) " It certainly made my day that my customer is so pleased especially when it is for a very special ceremony :)

The fact that is handmade, I had to bear in mind that I should never compare my crafts to similar factory products. The selling point is exclusivity, one of a kind or even limited edition. One more thing I always make sure is, never compromise on material quality and craftsmanship as well as service. With these, customers feel that it is more justifiable for them to pay a premium for handmades. However, from time to time, I do face tough competition from some who are willing to price down badly to gain market entry. It does worry me but when I think again rationally, in the long run, pricing low is not at all viable for the handmade business. After a short period, those who price very low may find it difficult to sustain. The amount of effort and energy put into making something is alot. As such, fellow crafters should value all our creations and take pride in our work. Why do designers charge a premium? That is because they do not mass produce from the factory. Their designs are limited and unique and most of all of high quality product. Thus I felt that as an artisan, who genuinely puts in dedicated hours and effort into my creations, I should value them and price them right!

Colours and Concept

I love using laces, cotton, silk and felt for Pixie Suzie, an accessory closet for littel girls. I am never a very girly female and pink is not always my favourite shade. In fact, if you ask me, I do not have a favourite colour. I feel that every colour and colour combination has to compliment the piece of accessory. It boils down to the concept and look that the artist wish to create for each of his/her design, be it a dress, a piece of jewellery, a t-shirt, a hat, a hair piece etc. As such, I do not quite agree that Pink and Red or only bright shades should appeal to girls and are colours that will only look nice on children. 

Ingrid

For example if I am creating a country look like the above hair band "Ingrid", I found those organic and earth tone colours really appealing. Put your sweetheart in a ivory shade cotton dress or any light shade outfit and this hairband will make the look perfect!

On the other hand, I would prefer to use a bright shade felt or a pastel shade felt for my Gardenia, Dahlia and Ruffled lace floral pieces as they look really sweet and pretty. Matching these pretty shades against contrasting headbands give them a touch of originality and freshness rather than sticking to the conventional combinations.

Experimenting with colours and concepts is one of the most exciting part of the design process, be it the hair accessories, ring pillows or jewellery. Putting a little more time and thought into this part of the design is always worth it as it almost always gives me a fun and fresh outcome. My motto "Be adventurous with colours!".

My Fray Roses

Tracy

Celeste

I simply fell in love with these fray roses when I first saw them. They are so versatile and lovely. Depending on the choice of fabric, it can be set on different accessories.
Some materials are easier to manipulate than others. I find good cotton materials with a good thread count much easier to handle than materials like Satin and silk.

The above are some of my latest creations. Pretty headbands for babies, toddlers and little girls.

Branding and marketing craftwork

Marketing is something many of us know we have to do whenever we start a business. It is one of the most crucial and tricky part of every business. But the questiong is always "How to market?"


I started my very first business when I was really young (about 23 years old) and it failed big time. I had no idea of what I needed to do to reach out to my target audience. Tonnes of expensive medias approached me and I simply thought that was the only way to go. Advertising on magazines was costly and the results weren't guaranteed. On top of that, I was clueless about how to price and position myself in the market. My cost was too high and the margin too low. I wounded it up....Bad bad bad....But I learnt a great deal from it!


Through my sister who completed her Diploma in Media design, I also learnt a great deal about branding and image which is getting so so vital these days. Creating a consistant image helps to promote the brand in the long run. In other words, an identity for customers to identify your brand with....from labels, to cards, brand tags right down to colours logos and fonts....there should always be a consistant look. I stuck by that notion and I must say it helped a great deal in my florist business which I sold it as my family feels it is getting too taxing and my husband I were planning a kids then.


I continued to make crafts while I was taking care of my child and started selling them online. With a brand and an identity and of course quality products, the little business (Eternal Covenant) did somehow take off, not in a large scale but enough for a housewife :). Thanks to my sister, I picked up some design and photoshop skills which helped alot. at least I do not need not pay for such stuff.


I am now looking more seriously into promoting my three brands of craft work and am still sticking to the importance of branding plus a new marketing tool....social marketing!! Let's hope to see some results in the months to come.


Here is a link I feel quite good for marketing crafts: http://www.inspiri-art-and-craft.com/craft-marketing.html

Jumping Clay

I was introduced to Jumping Clay by a friend who loves crafts too. It is fun and a great material for kids too as it is non toxic and can be air dried. Made some of the above with jumping clay. The colours are very bright and cheery!

The Pearl Collection

These lovely neck pieces are part of my pearl collection. In order to bring out the elegance in this collection, I have chosen to use high quality materials such as Swarovski and fresh water pearls. These pearls bring out a sophisticated flavour to the clay rose pendant. A great accessory for weddings, formal and semi-formal occasions and defintiely a great gift for the coming mother's day.

They are all available at my Etsy store: www.preciousfindings.etsy.com

*Like my facebook page and I will be giving away a FREE pair of matching clay rose earrings to all my fans with every purchase: www.facebook.com/cosyloft.

Deco Clay Craft

 
Being a florist before, I have a keen interest in flowers. I enjoy making my clay rose pendants (www.preciousfindings.etsy.com) with polymer clay which I stumbled upon by chance. I was exploring different ideas with clay and thought about I could offer something for weddings (which always fascinates me). Since there are crystal bouquests these days, I thought it will be nice to add some clay flowers to these crystal bouquets but polymer clay will seem to heavy.

As I was looking around the internet for more ideas and materials, I came across an interesting clay known as " Deco Clay Craft" http://www.decoclay.com/. It is a Japanese creation and they even have an academy for it. The flowers are amazing. I discovered that there is a school here (http://www.foreverblooms.com.sg/FBDG/Catalogue.html) that conduct classes and workshops and decided to give it a shot! I learnt to make roses that looked so real. It was indeed awesome. Not easy but a great experience. It is a craft that requires a huge amount of patience as every single petal is painstakingly sculptured and put together. It took me 4 hours to make 3 roses. Can you believe that? The best thing about this clay is it needs no oven. You simply need to air dry it. Looking forward to antoher workshop soon to learn another type of flower. One of my greatest finds!

Online Craftshow

I have been constantly seeking avenues to promote all my handmade crafts lately and discovered this online craft show http://handmadecraftshow.com/ which functions quite similarly to real life shows. basially they have booths allocated to participants starting from Aisle A all the way to H. Prices are really affordable and that makes it worth trying. Their target sellers comes from everywhere and mostly Etsy sellers. They even have a section where you can book and showcase your Etsy mini.

I am trying out to see how it goes. Will update soon on results. Really excited to see how well it will work.

Charlotte

This rose pendant is sculptured with pretty lilac polymer clay. The look is sweet and feminie. The pendant comes with a stainless steel chain.

Size of rose: about 1.5 n diameter
Length of chain: about 16" with extension

Price: USD18.00, SGD23.50
Available at: http://www.preciousfindings.etsy.com/

Gisele

This rose pendant is sculptured with  silver polymer clay. The look is chic and elegant. Goes really well with just a little black dress or top. The pendant comes with a stainless steel chain.

Size of rose: about 1.5" in diameter
Length of chain: about 16" with extension

Price: USD18.00, SGD23.50
Available at: http://www.preciousfindings.etsy.com/
SOLD

Rose Scarlett

This elegant rosette is sculptured with red polymer clay. I then set it on a antique brass ring shank filigree to give a romantic and vintage touch. The ring shank is adjustable. This will definitely be a ring that will make heads turn even when you simply match it with a simple casual or formal outfit. Come with a gift box.

Size of rose: about 1.5" in diameter

Price: USD15.00, SGD19.50
Available at : http://www.preciousfindings.etsy.com/

This pretty rose pendant is sculptured with bright yellow polymer clay. This is a perfect piece for both casual and formal occasions. It will even make a lovely gift for someone precious to you. The pendant comes with a stainless steel chain to match and a gift box.

Rose size: 1.2" in diameter
Length of chain: 17" (with extension)

Price: USD18.00, SGD23.50

Available at: http://www.preciousfindings.etsy.com/

Pink Lady

This elegant rose pendant is sculptured with dusky pink polymer clay. I accent it with a pair of antique brass filigree to give it a vintage and romantic touch. This is a perfect piece for both casual and formal occasions. It will even make a lovely gift for someone precious to you. The pendant comes with a brass chain to match and a gift box.

Rose size: about 1.5" in diameter
Length of chain: 16" (with extension)

Price: USD22.00, SGD$28.00

Available at : http://www.preciousfinding.etsy.com/
SOLD

Lady Victoria

This elegant rose pendant is sculptured with ivory polymer clay. I accent it with a antique brass leaf filigree to give it a vintage and romantic touch. This is a perfect piece for both casual and formal occasions. It will even make a lovely gift for someone precious to you. The pendant comes with a brass chain to match and a gift box.

Rose size: about 1.5" in diameter
Length of chain: 16" (with extension)

Price: USD20.00, SGD26.00

Available at: http://www.precioufindings.etsy.com/
SOLD