2016 Holiday Markets

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Want to shop with us in person? Mark your calendars those opportunities are right on the horizon!

We're looking forward to vending in Seattle for the first time and really looking forward to our return to Crafty Wonderland in Portland! 

Hope to see you there!

Lasers and love - Thea 

Winter Shows!

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Ack! We're so excited to announce that we will be vending at two large craft shows this winter season! We wanted to do a few more shows and will be doing one private event in mid December, but there is only so much time on the calendar. So we had to choose wisely and hoped that we got picked and we did!

Our first show is a month away! We will be vending at our first ever Seattle craft show - Urban Craft Uprising. I (Thea) am no stranger to this show. I've been a vendor in every single UCU show up until this one. But I am more than excited to be bringing my new company to the show. It's fun to mix it up a bit. This show is so much fun! There's even a Preview Night and for the first time ever there will be adult drinks! Preview night is December 2nd and entry is by ticket only. For more information about Preview Night check out the link here. 

Details about the open to the public show are available below - entrance is free! 

After a super fun weekend in Seattle, we will be heading down to Portland for our return to Crafty Wonderland's Holiday Art and Craft Market!!!

Crafty Wonderland will also be hosting a ticketed First Pick Pre Show Party. More information about tickets are available here. 

Details about the open to the public market is below and entrance is free!

www.craftywonderland.com

We are so excited to be vending at both of these shows! We're excited to meet with new and returning customers and catch up with our fellow makers too! 

Mark your calendars and start making your lists! Both shows are unique and have their own vibe. I can't recommend them both enough!

Lasers and love - Thea 

All is well again with 6 by 6 at Handmade at Amazon

in ,

I just wanted to do a little follow up about our recent strange experience with our shop at Handmade at Amazon. For a quick refresher about what happened to us - visit this post.

I posted that post link on various social media outlets and even tagged Handmade at Amazon in a post or two directly, hoping to gain any attention. Being in the Seattle area, we have a handful of friends who work at Amazon and extended offers to connect me to someone who could help. Which ultimately got me in contact with someone at Amazon! 

I received an email a day or two after posting my blog post about our experience from an actual person at Amazon. He inquired about my issue and I directed him to my blog post for reference, since I laid it all out there. Soon after that contact our account was restored! He did offer a direct phone call with me after our account was restored just to make sure that we were good to go. I declined because we got what we wanted, just to have access to our account again.

Shortly after that, I received a direct email from the leads at Handmade at Amazon team. They just wanted to speak with me about my experience over the phone, which I appreciated. They were very apologetic and told me that what happened to us was a weird isolated event, which was reassuring. The two that I spoke with were very nice and gave me the platform to mention things that I felt were frustrating. For me it I was bent out of shape about not being transferred to the department that I needed to speak to by a customer service representative. C'mon I know Amazon has that ability! Secondly, my disappointment in the the on site representatives promoting makers to join Handmade at Amazon at a large local craft lack of information for contacts for sellers. Lastly, this one was more on my own personal expectations as a long time maker, I'm used to having one on one contact with selling sites (I've been with Etsy a long time and have met quite a few admins over the years and they were always very accessible) and direct contact with customers. It's apart of the charm of the handmade maker scene. You are buying from a person who put their hard work and hands on the products. It's a personal experience. I felt that element was missing from Amazon's support. 

In the end, we got the help that we needed after all. I hated having to get the attention that we wanted to resolve the issue the way we did though. Thankfully, we were told it was an isolated incident but they wanted to make sure something like this will not happen to other sellers, which was nice to hear. 

Thanks to everyone who shared this and got us the help we needed.

Lasers and love -Thea

Last chance for Priority Mail TODAY and a sale on discontinued stuff!

in ,

We’ve been busy cleaning up post craft show season. We’re also already looking ahead at what’s next for us. We’ll be at the Seattle Gift Show next month along with new and redesigned items.

So we do have a small handful of items that will be discontinued. I’ve posted a few at discounted prices over in our Etsy shop: www.6by6arts.etsy.com

I’ve also included a few display signs that were used at events and shows. Get them while they are hot!

2015-12-19 12.43.42.jpg

To my fellow procrastinators, today is the LAST DAY for USPS Priority Mail shipping. We are headed out with our last orders around 3pm today. If you miss out and still want something sent, it will cost ya, but we can arrange it- just shoot us a note.

On a personal note, college kid #1 is coming home today; volleyball kid had a practice at o’dark thirty this morning what a way to start my birthday week (my birthday is Friday –yep THAT day). This week will be ending with the college kid #2 moving out. He waited to start his adventure until winter quarter. The party never ends over here.

I hope you all have short workweeks this week!

Lasers and love -Thea

New Stockist - The Space Needle

in ,

I'm not even sure how to begin this one because I have so many feels about it!

I'm a native Washingtonian that grew up on Whidbey Island during a time where there really wasn't much but trees and the Navy. My mom is Asian and we'd often make trips into the city for "Asian" food supplies long before there was any ethnic markets close by. I distinctly remember my dad driving, my mom singing off key to the current tunes of the early 80's and me peering out of my backseat window and seeing the Space Needle rise up on the horizon as we got closer to the International District. 

Every time I saw the Space Needle I'd imagine one of two things - that Seattle was the land of The Jetson's or that Wheedle was sitting atop the Needle. Seattle was a magical land to this small town island girl and the Space Needle was and still is THE landmark of the city.

A page from a vintage coloring book I've had for years. I referred to this for inspiration during the design process. 

When you think of city landmarks, you think tourists. When you think of tourists, you think of souvenirs. A lot of times they are cheap little magnets with a glossy photo enclosed in plastic, or something along those lines. When we were approached by the Space Needle people; A.) I don't think I've ever tried to act so cool and collected in my life. B.) They told me that they were interested in adding some new but different products for their gift shop. I think I actually looked around to see if I was the person who that question was being directed at. And C.) When they told me to "just see what I can come up with" and gave us permission to use their image and brand name, I went into full on panic. 

Why would the great and awesome Space Needle people ask me and my extremely tiny company to do anything for them? They could ask anyone to do this sort of thing for them, but they asked us. A local mom and pop shop. Whoa.

While we can get down with some elaborate design work, I really felt that we should keep the products we pitched at them simple and functional. 

Pages from my sketchbook: Although, the artwork is crude, we first spend a lot of time flushing out the concept before we laser cut the prototype. We decide if the layout works or in this case how usable would the writing area be. I often leave question marks on the pages about various things. 

I drew out a simple layout of a small chalkboard with the silhouette of the Space Needle cut out. Lots of usable space for love notes or reminders. I envisioned someone picking one up on New Year's Eve and someone writing a proposal on it. (Hey, I said I had the feels with this one!)

The second thing we pitched was a souvenir magnet. We really wanted it to be unique amongst the others. This was my opportunity to incorporate a small bit of my childhood imagination. The Jetson's shapes and sounds always made me think of the Space Needle. So I sketched out a mid century modern shape and John found an image of the Space Needle that included the architectural underground footings in their image archives that he liked. We selected a font similar to one on their website. Their website by the way, is AWESOME. 

Pages from my sketchbook: I drew out many versions of the wood magnet. I had a mid century modern "Jetson's like shape in mind. Like always with my raw drawings John took an actual picture of my drawing and used it as a guide in Corel to fine tune it. 

We did this as we do all of our original work, we both do crucial parts of the development. I depended on John to help me finalize the shapes I was hoping for. Sometimes I just can't draw the exact thing I had in mind. Also, I am far better at drawing freehand rather than in outlines. I initially spent a lot of time actually drawing the Space Needle in great detail. PAGES of drawings. The our final prototypes were approved on the first submission. 

We rounded the edges from my original drawing. 

Close up of the laser cut out Space Needle. We have a bunch of these cut outs now in the studio. 

We were able to engrave the product details and pricing on the back. Which is so awesome in a retail environment.

The final shape was the shape I had envisioned. I want to publicly compliment John for being so great at figuring out what I was trying to get out. The architectural design with the footings looks so great! It's hard to tell here because this is a picture from my phone, but I was so excited to share this news I took a quick photo to share.

It's an honor to have been asked to do this for the Space Needle. We're continuing to develop more too! Next time you're at the Space Needle look for our work. 

Lasers and love -Thea

Artist Reception at The Handmade Showroom

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Do you recall a little bit ago we mentioned that we were one of the founding artists at The Handmade Showroom in Pacific Place?

A quick refresher, it's super great pop up shop that features many local artists' work in the heart of downtown Seattle. Every time we've been in there, we've been totally delighted to see the handmade displays and of course the amazing work available for sale. 

This Thursday evening The Handmade Showroom is hosting an Artist Reception at the store! 

From their site: 

We are excited to join the celebration of Fall fashion for ‪#‎StyleuPP‬ by Seattle Magazine happening at Pacific Place Seattle this week!

Visit us on Thursday evening for an exclusive reception to meet our artists, taste wares from our artisanal food vendors, view our collection of amazing handmade work, and get a head start on your holiday shopping lists!

Special on-site tastings with:
Delicately Sweet Confections - Salted Caramel Sauce
Sweet Caroline's Jams - limited edition artisan jams made with seasonal fruits
The Kitchen Imp - hand-blended organic spices and seasonings

In addition to all the fun we will have on hand, there will be a live fashion show happening at Pacific Place, so come early and join in on the fun of fashion!

The Showroom is located on the third floor next to the Nordstrom Skybridge.

All are welcome, so be sure to invite your friends to join in on the fun! We look forward to seeing you Thursday!

https://www.facebook.com/events/299268300243651/

John and I will be there! We've recently restocked The Showroom with some exclusive items. We hope to see many of our local friends there!

Lasers and love - Thea

New stockist - The Museum of Flight

in

Although, we've been working many long hours for what feels like slow and steady building for our still infant business, we've managed to get a "dream" customer. When I lived in West Seattle, my son's class had a field trip to The Museum of Flight. He came home exhilarated from all the awesome things he saw and learned about. That went on for days and even now that he's a junior in high school he still mentions every once in a while. 

When we were approached by the Museum of Flight to design a couple products for the museum's gift shop in addition to some of our original designs, it was a like scoring instant mom points with my son who is such a fan. 

I already had a rocket ship chalkboard magnet in development as well as some constellation "ornaments". 

Rocket ship mini chalkboard with magnets.

We designed it so a photo or drawing could appear in the rocket ship.

A photo the size of a standard small school issued photo. 

Constellation wood ornaments - 6 by 6 Arts

They asked us to develop some additional chalkboard magnet designs, a helicopter and a plane. 

These designs are currently only available at The Museum of Flight Store. 

The designs are simple and themed of course, but it was still a complete honor to do this project and be asked to carry our original works too. As a Navy "brat" who grew up around a Naval Air Base here in Washington I love everything that The Museum of Flight offers and shares. 

Lasers and love - Thea