SUSTAINABILITY AND ECONOMICS

Just wanted to give you an update of what I’m doing.

I have been in Germany exactly for one year and two days now. I LOVE IT!! I’m so glad I’m back!

I’ve met up with old friends, met lots of great new people, went to places in Berlin I hadn’t been before, some of them didn’t even exist when I left, went to workshops, moved a couple of times, got a studio, then got a new studio, made things, did a business course, wrote a business plan, changed it, then changed it again and am just enjoying life.

Impressions of my new studio: lantern

I started to think about my business in a more holistic, professional way. About, how I could integrate it into my life better and be more satisfied with it. Not exploiting myself, nature, other people or animals.

Wow, that’s quite a task! I got pretty high standards on how it should be and sometimes have some doubts if I can pull it off with the business skills I’ve got ...

There are so many things to think about..

I got this in my studio too now. So me!:)

I’m feeling bad, coz a few times I’ve said I’m getting there, but then it took much longer then I thought.

So I’ll give you a few things I’m working on,

 ♥ I wanna change production to exclusively organic and recycled fabrics

 ♥ I wanna produce everything locally

 ♥ everything needs to be vegan(except for a couple of wool dresses I sold in the beginning of Lyptis, all of my stuff was anyways)

 ♥ there will be stuff for kids and for men

Strangely, I just figured out the other day, that Lyptis was quite a sustainable brand already. You know, handmade in Australia, but also cuz, I almost exclusively used deadstock fabrics. I knew what deadstock was, I just didn’t know I was using it. Strange, right?!

So, that makes me feel better and now it’s just about taking it to another level.

Picture a friend gave me. Also in my studio.

About the economics, I haven’t studied business or something like that. I’m just making things up as I go, picking something up from other self-employees, from classes and the net. 

I would like to live off my own label, but sometimes it feels like there is so much to learn. And it feels quite overwhelming at times.

Spring Greetings from Berlin!

But then, I think about all the cool things I could make, and how making things in a more environmentally conscious way would be a great thing to do. And most importantly, I think of all the sweet customers I had, some of which are still writing to me, after I had my Etsy shop closed for over a year, asking when I’d open again, so they can buy more dresses. Wow, really, I gotta say that’s so nice! 

And the once that always left such sweet feedback on my page(I think I need to show it off), it always made my day, even after so many feedbacks. Thank you so much!

I hope I will be able to show everyone some new stuff soon. And I think it’s gonna be cool. 

And I’m very grateful that you’re still with me! Thanks!

MAKING PRETTY THINGS YOURSELF: HULA HOOP WEAVING

Yesterday, my Etsy Berlin Street Team, organized an awesome workshop at the Etsy Labs in Berlin.
Hula Hoop Weaving!!

Super easy and really fun! If you or your friends have a lot of fabric scraps lying around, this is an awesome project to do. Here is a perfect tutorial. I will spare you my own tutorial attempt, as I didn't take pictures with the single steps along the way.

Anyways, here are pictures of a couple of projects.

Unterwater theme? Nice!

Alex was using silk scraps, which took more time to do(thinner fabric). Pretty colours!

My work in progress.

And the finished result. I'm very happy with it!!

At first I wasn't quite sure what you'd use a rug like that for. I was thinking of putting the rug on my studio wall, but up to know it's a seat cover. Very pretty!! And rustic..

And a detail.

It turned out much nicer then I thought. And you can do so many variations, in colour and texture and whatnot.
Just be careful, when you use jersey fabrics, don't stretch them too much, otherwise your rug is going to look more like a bowl then, you know, flat.
I feel like doing some more now! Try it out, it's pretty easy and a satisfying project to do.

MINI LYPTIS

I put some pictures of my kids clothing up on my facebook page just before I left. It was a really, really stressful time and I still haven’t gotten around to blog about it. Actually just thinking about the time before I left makes me feel like stomach ulcers and anxiety attacks all over again.

I thought kids clothing would be kind of a cool thing to do. And I’ve made some men's stuff before too, which I haven’t blogged about yet, but there are some pics on my facebook page too. It’s cool to make some other clothing sometimes, something in a different shape, for different people. It gives you a more complete understanding of the human form and of what people need in their clothing. And it’s fun!!

Maybe I will start selling some. Why not, right?! I think they are cute. Of curz I had a really cute, little model too. 

Ok, tell me what you think and what sort of kids clothing would be cool. Or what other stuff you want to see in my “new shop”.

All the Best and have a great day!

Giveaway

I said in this post I might do a Giveaway once I hit 400 Etsy sales. I hit it a while ago, but never gotten around to setting it up.

So yeah, I will randomly draw 5, from this and next months customers, to receive some dresses of their choice(depending on availability). Might even throw in something extra for some of my repeat customers too. Coz I Love, Love, Love my customers, especially the repeat ones!:)

Deadline is the 28th of March and I'll announce the winners on my blog.

Other then that, Everything is 50%off in my shop at the moment. Have a look, I can still make certain custom orders, but not for much longer. All the Best. Love.x

A SALE AND NEW DESIGNS

Made a couple of leggings lately. What you reckon?

 Platinum Leggings

This is the first pair i ever made, pretty awesome right?! I wear leggings every day in winter. Every. Day. Strict No Pant Rule. So yeah, dunno why it took me so long..

 Cherry Blossom Night

One of my favourites, kind of subtle, but kind of not. Cute print too.

Bubblegum Scrunchy Leggings

And those ones, not so subtle, but still one of my favourites(you notice a theme here?)

They and everything else in my shop are on Sale at the moment, just put in coupon code: 'IWANTSUMMER' at checkout and receive 20%off(until Sunday).

Have a super awesome and lovely and sunny weekend.:)

LYPTIS UPDATE

Have you seen the feature on Lyptis on Maddablings blog? It was pretty fun to answer some questions and take some pictures of my studio.

That's me in my studio

I'm planning on doing a Giveaway once i hit 300 likers on my facebook page. At the moment i got 100, give or take a few, but i just wanted to give you a heads up. The Giveaway has to run trough my blog though, because of Facebook's policies, which is kind of annoying, but that's how they roll.

Thinking about giving away one of these.

I might even do one when i hit 400 Etsy Sales. Watch this space and i'll also keep you updated on my Facebook page of course.

Other then that here are some new items.

Hoodie Cowl Jumper in Cherry Red

High Waisted Circle Skirt

Making some shrugs tomorrow which i'll list throughout the week. And i'm thinking about listing some fleece jumper dresses in white. What you think?

What Ya Doing At The Weekend?

So, it's the weekend what are you up to?
I will tell you what i am doing.
That's where i am going tonight, a talk by Gail Dines and i'm so excited.

I just think this woman is amazing. You can check out one of her websites here. I watched a couple of her youtube videos and she's pretty awesome. If you are interested in this this is another great website www.antipornography.org, its got heaps of resources on it.

Last weekend i checked out the Handmade Show in Oakleigh, Melbourne, to see what my friends were up to there. Pretty cozy venue with a little stage and velvet curtains. I also got to take a picture of this ..rabbit. First i thought it had little boobs but we got corrected pretty quickly by the little artist herself. Those are paws of courz! Didn't you hate that when you were a kid and people didn't know what they were talking about? I sure did.

Cute!

Ok, a picture of my friend Kerri of Vintage Sew And So. I'm afraid she is gonna bite my head off when she sees it, coz she looks a bit angry in it. But she is really a nice lady. She brought her teenage daughter along too. Lucky for her her daughter is really sweet, at that age some girls are lying in a drug induced coma in the street gutter. I won't name any names..
Anyways, that's Kerri and her stall..(my camera is pretty crap with indoor lighting, so this is the only half decent picture).

Love those polka dotted buntings..

Yeah, normally i just loiter around the streets of Melbourne on my weekends.. Last time i ran into this guy.. Dunno, maybe that's what these Melbournians consider to be art/culture? It's fuckin scary!

 

So what you doing? Are there any things you'd like to see or try?

 

THE MIRROR

Last Saturday i went to see the show for Hopeless Lingerie’s new range The Mirror. Inspired by the duality of good and evil it’s an all white collection made for honeymooning brides and of course everyone else.

The show was held at the Butterfly Club, a kinda kitschy/creepy cabaret bar in Melbourne’s South, which is just an extraordinary venue.

Anyways, the show was nice and Gaby was nice, we had only met over the internet previously so it was great meeting her in person and to have a bit of a chat to her.
We got there a bit early, but the atmosphere was surprisingly relaxed and loungy, not at all as stressful and frantic as i expected.

Not being used to shoot pictures in dimly lit rooms i was fiddling around with my camera settings for half of the time, but i’m actually quite happy with how the pictures turned out.

My favourite piece

So i thought i would ask Gaby a couple of questions about the show and the range and she was so kind to answer them for me.

...

So first of all i wanna Congratulate you again on a successful show. It was really cool. Do you wanna tell us a bit about the people that were involved in organizing it?

I pretty much organized it all myself! I only had a week in which to do it, and thankfully two of my wonderful model friends were happy to help out. And also another friend who is a makeup artist was available to do that side of things at short notice. The venue is owned by a friend of a friend so that side of things was also very lucky!

How many shows have you done already? How are they different? What are you learning from them?

I have only been part of one other group show - and that was with 7 other brands - it was a very different experience and much more stressful, as I did not get to make any decisions about models, running order, timing or anything else. This was a much better experience as I could really do what I wanted to do, and could run things to my liking. Next time it would be great to have a little more time to invite guests and have a couple more models. Other than that there is not much I would do differently! I think the most important thing is to have a great venue, and then most of the work is already done for you.

How did you come up with using Tony from Terry Gilliam's Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus as an inspiration for the range?

I always base my ranges around a film. And I am a huge fan of Terry Gilliam - after watching the film I thought it would be best to take one element to use as inspiration, as there as so many visual elements I could have been distracted by. I like how Tony always wears a white suit, and you are never really sure if he is good or bad.

Gaby with her lovely models

What’s next for Hopeless?

I plan on doing 3 more small ranges this year (one for each season) and then another show at the end of the year!

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Hopeless Lingerie’s on Etsy
Hopeless Lingerie on Facebook

RANDOM UPDATE

Over Christmas we made some furniture for our new, much nicer house. Haven't gotten around to posting pictures til now, but here they are.
We built a towel ladder,

 Then we built a seat for the lounge, here it is as work in progress, not sanded yet.

I'm especially proud of this one, key bench/coat rack thing,

I'm trying to use natural finishes as much as possible, here are some shellac flakes, before being dissolved in methylated spirits. The finish turns out really nice, golden and shiny, but is not resistant to heat at all.:( It seems pretty waterproof tho.

Not getting around to doing much since i have been working full-time/overtime after Christmas. Don't know how other people still have hobbies/a life besides their dayjob and keeping their house clean which is a priority for me.

Anyways, here are some messages for the like 5 people who read my blog sometimes,
Sandy, when you guys get some black (double) knit fabric in can you let me know? I have been looking my fuckin eyes out all over Melbourne and frankly I am pretty sick of it and thinking of migrating(not sure that would help though).

Soner, i know you asked me ages ago, but yeah, when you click the link on the left hand side with all the little pictures of my dresses on it, you get redirected to my website/shop. Depending on your browser settings it should open another window.

Snowbrush, Thanks for asking, I am ok, just really freaking busy! Anyways, yes i used to follow your blog, but not anymore coz you're always so mean to your lady. But don't take that too personal i don't really read blogs in general, almost never. And Yes the pet moved outside. I also blocked the door now, so there shouldn't be any new pets coming along. Hope you're well too.

Christian, Hi!:)

And Hi Louisa, I'm glad you like my blog. Leave a comment!:)

Love Coney Island

And Hello of course to all the other readers. Leave a comment and say Hello! Always nice to meet you guys!:)
You can follow my Facebook page, i set one up for my label,
http://www.facebook.com/lyptis
That would be awesome!
Its a bit bare coz i just set it up, but it won't be for long if you're leaving some nice comments and pictures(NICE pictures) on it.:)

WHAT'S HAPPENING WITH MY LIFE

This weekend we are moving into a new house. We were actually planning on moving (back) to Berlin in spring next year, in April, but then we postponed it for another year.
We have been doing this for probably the last 3 years and i'm feeling truly sorry for my 3 friends back home who i'm always telling i will be back soon.
I have been living in Australia for almost 5 years now and i'm not sure if it's life in the suburbs, Australian culture or my dead end jobs, but my brain feels like it has been soaked in fabric softener for too long and it's not a nice feeling.

But we decided to be sensible and stay another year, need to save up quite a bit of money to move there and not stress about it. But i REALLY wanted to move into a new house. The house we got now.. where do i start..?! We actually found a new one quite quickly this time, i loved it straight away, it's got floorboards, a nice kitchen and bathroom, it's fairly big and bright, it's got a patio and even partial solar power. Now, that is pretty cool.
So now it's all comparing fridges, carpet cleaners and electricity providers for me. Not too exciting, but i'm looking forward to getting it all organized and settling in.

My label has been on the back burner for a little while now, actually a year, since i started working full-time again. I'm getting a new studio, it's smaller, only one room, now i got 2, but i'm sure it's gonna be nice. So once i set it all up i might be able to focus on some new stuff.

I also booked a new craft class, just for me. It's an upholstery class and i'm pretty excited about it.

It's gonna be great to do up some old chairs i got around the house, i also wanna get myself some cool sanders for Christmas. Awesome. Stay tuned, because i am planning on putting up before/after pictures.

I also told all my twitter friends about my new upholstery obsession and my lovely friend Kerri decided to book the class with me. I'm so excited. Now we can drool over fabrics and power tools together.

 

So that's basically it, i'm staying here for now, got a new house, a new studio and hopefully some pretty upcycled furniture soon. And i also wanna do a dressmaking class, once i find one that fits my schedule. 

  

You got any exciting new plans?  Let me know, i'd love to hear about them.

I took the photos in New York. I Love NY. And i miss it. I call the pictures 'Studies in Steel', i love steel too.

ALTERNATIVE LIFESTYLES

Sometimes life feels like just ticking the boxes and filling in the blanks.
You go to school, get a job, get a partner, marry, have kids, get a car, a house, stuff and have the optional hobby and travel.
Not that its necessarily bad to live like that, but it would be good if there were some more options.

For example, of course, i can decide if i want to have kids or not, but as a woman, i feel I'm living in a society where its expected from me to become a mother at some point, otherwise my life is not seen as completely fulfilled.

It can be difficult at the best of times to go your own way in this society, but i think its important to stand up for the life you want to live and to be the person you truly feel you are.

I want to share with you some different ways of living, videos of different housing solutions people chose for their lives which i find interesting.

The first is about an eco village in Kew, where people occupied vacant land and built tents and huts from reclaimed material, started to grow their own food and live sustainably.
As far as i heard the Kew site has been evicted by now, but people are always on the lookout for new land and might actually have a new site already by now.



Then there is Coed Hills, an artist community living in the forests of South Wales.
I like the yurts. I like some of the ideas. Probably would hang out there for 2 or 3 weeks, but i like my hot shower and clean clothes(its a bit muddy).



And then there is my ABSOLUTE favourite way of building houses and living and that is the 'Earthships'!

The earthship concept got to be THE most sustainable way of building houses and its just so elegant and stylish.
I don't think living consciously and in harmony with nature can't also be amazingly beautiful and comfortable at the same time and it just makes so much sense.

Once i got money i surely will get one of these, might even build some of it myself.



If you wanna find out more about this subject, you might wanna watch 'Garbage Warrior'. Its a documentary about the founder of the earthships and explains the idea even better.
I cant find the movie online, but here is the trailer,

RAINBOWREVOLUTION-LEARN FROM THE BEST(DUST TEAM)

Today im feeling very honoured to give you an interview with one of our best-selling shops from the DUST team(Down Under Street Team), Leanne from Rainbowrevolution.
Leanne makes colourful scarves and wraps and other beautiful rainbow items and i hope you will enjoy reading about her experiences as much as i do!

•How did you get into making scarves and dying?

I have been using dyes for quite a few years now…all sorts of things from bedspreads to clothing, curtains …anything that needed a bit of colour always went into a dye bath or got painted in some way. I remember first doing the classic tye dye styles when I was a kid at school. I enjoy doing scarves and wraps because I use a style of dyeing that is more like painting and I can get some really smooth blends between the colours which then creates new colours…I love seeing what colours appear between colours.

•What did you do before?

LOL I have done so many things but my work before creating this business was and still is to some extent as a Colour Therapist. I taught Colour Therapy subjects for some time in a Natural Therapies college in Sydney whilst working as a Colour Therapy Practitioner and Colour Consultant.

•Tell us a bit about your work as a Colour Therapy practitioner!

Well working as a Colour Therapist is quite fascinating. My main focus is to help people understand themselves through the colours that they choose and then work with that for personal growth. My main tool is Aura Soma which is one of the most beautiful forms of Colour Therapy that I have found. I have also worked with Coloured Light Therapy and have seen some amazing results. I find that colour therapy helps bring what is in the subconscious into consciousness and once this occurs we can work towards a life of greater happiness and peace within ourselves…clear away the layers that we don’t even realize might be holding us back from living as we are truly meant to live.

•When did you know you could do your business full-time? What kind planning did you do before the jump?

I have set out from the beginning to work in my business fulltime. I am a single mother of two teenage girls and feel very strongly about being ‘here’ for them as much as possible. The best way I could see to do that and to keep us all happy was to firstly do something I love doing and secondly do it from home.

•Where do you sell your products, what venues work best for you and why?

I sell my products all over the place now. I have wholesale customers all over the world as well as in Australia. Etsy has been fantastic for helping me get my products out there. All my international wholesale accounts have come via Etsy.
I also have a website which I think has been another good venue for getting myself known. For a long time in the early days I did a lot of markets and festivals which also gave me a lot of exposure.
I am finding now that online marketing is really shifting and social sites such as Facebook and Twitter are pushing me out there even further and more quickly.

•How did you hear about Etsy?

I actually don’t remember…I have a feeling it was while I was researching keywords and things for my website…I think it was truly a case of stumbling onto it.

•Worst business mistake you made? What improvements were the most helpful?

This has been the biggest learning curve of my life and many little mistakes have occurred along the way and I am sure there will be many more to come! One of the biggest mistakes would probably have to be with consignment. I will never do consignment again. I think in the early stages I was so happy that someone was interested in my work that I just said yes…very messy and challenging. Now I am much more discerning about who gets my stock..after all these are my babies..my creations….I want them to be loved and cared for. I like to be able to offer exclusivity to my customers so I don’t sell to two shops in the same area.

•What advice can you give people who just started or thinking about going full-time?

My advice is…HAVE PATIENCE! You have to allow at least three years to build your business. Don’t expect to set up your shop and then instantly have a full time wage. Be prepared to learn a lot and if you possibly can afford it hand out the jobs that you really can’t do to someone who can. I get an accountant to do my tax and I am about to get someone to do my bookwork. I get my mother to do my banking when needed. I also pay for ironing if I am totally overloaded. In the beginning it is very tempting to work very long days…be careful of burn out. You still want to keep loving your work!

•How do you get yourself through a creative/business slump?

Unfortunately this does happen…I think if it didn’t we would combust. I used to fight against it…kicking and screaming….but that never worked. Now I just let it be…If I have slumped I need to acknowledge that. I know it will pass and often a slump precedes a burst of creativity and energy. It is not in my nature to accept slumps gracefully and I do find it quite difficult to stop the creative cogs turning. To combat that I write every thing, every idea or design down in my big red book of ideas. That helps me relax because I know the idea will be there for me to come back to and not lost in the ethers somewhere!

•How does a usual day look like? How do you manage your time?

My usual day starts at about 6.30 am. I am up and I usually have a couple of hours on the computer attending to emails etc. The kids go off to school at about 8am and once they are gone I have my breakfast in peace! I am usually down in my workshop by about 9am. I try to have at least 3-4 days a week in production and 1 day a week to catch up on all the other bits and pieces. I usually finish my day by about 3.30pm when the kids get home. When orders are really coming in I do often work until about 6pm. It can be a long day but it is usually very fulfilling. Working at home presents challenges in itself. It is very tempting to look around your home and see all the things that need attending to but I have to say to myself that I am at work and the house work can wait until later. One thing that is on my list for the near future is to get a cleaner in regularly.

•What kind of dyes/dying processes do you use? How does it work?

I use fibre reactive dyes which are dyes that penetrate well into the fibre and not just sit on top. This makes them quite colourfast and fade resistant. Mostly I use a painting method to apply the dyes although I love to experiment with all sorts of processes. I recently started playing with making dyes from the flowers barks and leaves from my garden and surrounds.
This has been very exciting with some lovely results although the dyes are not quite as colourfast and I can’t get such a wide range of colours this way.
I usually paint one day and rinse and dry the next morning and then paint some more. I use natural fabrics such as cotton, hemp, silk, linen and bamboo.

•Random Question: At the moment i like the colour yellow, what does that mean?

Well…yellow is an interesting colour. It is a colour that a lot of people like but don’t feel comfortable wearing. It deals a lot with working with your fears and searching for happiness in life. It is a colour that helps us build self confidence and a bright outlook on life. Nervousness and day to day fears reside within yellow. Choosing it as a favourite colour can mean that you are wanting to look towards life more optimistically and positively and are feeling a bit more outgoing and happy.

--
Thanks Leanne for doing this interview with me, it has been very interesting and enjoyable!

Follow Leanne on twitter, http://twitter.com/rainbowrev
and her blog http://rainbowrevolution.blogspot.com
and check out her website and Etsy shop here,
http://rainbowrevolution.com.au
http://rainbowrevolution.etsy.com

1.ETSYVERSARY

Yay, my first Etsyversary! Reason to celebrate.

So, i had my Etsy shop/business for 1 year now, i think i learned a lot and i met a lot of great people.

Last year around this time i quit my day job and 1 year later i got a new one, part time, im working in a biscuit factory now.

Yeah, very fun, its stupid work, and the biscuits are dry and really hard crackers really.

Have to pay the bills some time.

I started giving my shop a bit of an overhaul, im adding more ready made sizes and colours to save shipping time for my customers, but there are still custom options available.



I also wanna add more and more items, i dont really have a deadline but i wanna have like 100-150 items in my shop soon, work up some inventory, improve patterns and pictures and organization.

I have added some new Eskimo Dresses to my shop, here is one, and here is the other.

More coming soon.

I also added some new colours and new styles.

What do you reckon?

What styles would you like to see more in my shop?

I will definitely add some jumpers(sweaters) soon, more hoody/pocket stuff.

And there is still 10-20% off my whole store til the 9th of October(Etsy time).

Im also planning on doing my FIRST GIVEAWAY on my blog soon, so stay tuned!

WELCOME TO WORM WORLD

GOOD WORM (Candy Dragon Worm)

BAD WORMS (also commonly know as serger worms; they tend to live and crawl out of ur sewing machine, the more u sew the more serger worms u get, if u dont vacuum them away regularly one day u will choke on them)

I adopted Snowball Worm, she made good friends with Brunhilde(in the middle) and sheep(well, that black sheep on the right). Now she spends her days with me in my cutting room, she is very content and quiet. Just lovely!

I also wanted to introduce u to The Worm Lady, but unfortunately i cudnt find a picture of her. This woman is a London poet who participates every second Tuesday in a poetry slam at the Foundry in Shoreditch.

Its crazy, all her poems are about worms, i can barely understand a word of it and shes got quite a following. I think her catch phrase is something like "..and they sway from siiide to siiide" with all her followers chanting along, its really quite a site to be seen and i highly recommend it if u ever get to East London on a particular Tuesday. The Foundry is nice for a drink too, aah the good ol' days!!