Perhaps the term crafting conjures up memories of your grandmother patching a quilt or working on her needlepoint. Or maybe it makes you think of the construction paper and pipe cleaners you glued together in kindergarten, or the scrapbooks you made in middle school.
But here in Squamish, there’s a growing group of artists and entrepreneurs who are taking crafting in a whole new direction, building their businesses by creating unique, handcrafted pieces – with no pipe cleaners to be found.
This sizable community’s support is something that Meghan McCrone, the local maker behind Muddy Marvels Pottery, credits with keeping her going.
“[Working with other local businesses] is what I love,” she said. “People don’t think about Squamish as being an arts centre… but that’s something we need to focus on more.”
In addition to hosting monthly pottery workshops suitable for all levels of experience, McCrone, who holds a fine art degree in ceramics from Emily Carr University, focuses on creating functional pottery, like mugs, bowls, teapots and pour-overs.
“I really wanted to be able to use my work, and I wanted people to buy it and have it become an integral part in their daily rituals,” she said.
“But it’s not just the function that’s important to me. I want it to be something that heightens your daily rituals, like that favourite mug that becomes your friend because you always reach for it in the morning when you’re groggy… You want things to be celebrated but also practical.”
McCrone started Muddy Marvels after moving to Brackendale with her husband and two young children about six years ago, convincing her husband to build her a backyard pottery studio.
“That’s when I really turned on the focus to my own creative endeavours,” she said.
But with only so many hours in a day, McCrone – who, in addition to being a mother and artist, works full-time as an art and handwork teacher at Cedar Valley Waldorf School – said it can be difficult to focus on building her business when her family, work and pottery demand so much of her time. Leading up to Christmas craft fair season, McCrone said she’s been typically working on her pottery between 8 p.m. and 1 a.m. after putting her kids to bed.
“It’s exhausting but it’s also rejuvenating,” she said. “I don’t know how to explain it, but I find if you’re a creative person and you don’t have that creative outlet I find it more exhausting.”
Moving forward, McCrone is hoping to figure out how to most effectively sell her work online, a process that’s proved difficult in the past.
“Pottery is so time consuming. It takes at least a month to get something started to finish... (and) the process of the online selling is almost as time consuming as it is to make it,” she explained.
“It’s sorting out the balance between being a small business owner, having a family and having a career.”
For now, McCrone’s pottery can be found at a few stores in Squamish, including Nootka Naturals and the Adventure Centre.
She also sells her pottery at regional craft fairs, such as the upcoming Refresh Market, set to take place at the West Coast Railway Heritage Park from November 18 to 19. The indie fair will feature about 100 vendors from across the region.
Another artist set to man a vendor booth at the Refresh Market is Justine Brooks, a Squamish-based jewelry designer known for creating a wide variety of raw, nature-inspired pieces typically cast in metal.
“I like to make timeless pieces that have a sentimental element to the wearer,” she explained.
While Brooks’ first foray into jewelry design occurred early on, making beaded jewelry as a child, as an adult she ventured into making pieces for family and friends out of mussel shells collected from the beach. But this passion took a turn when, in 2005, Brooks took her first-ever jewelry lesson in the Indian Himalayas, working with raw silver straight from the ground.
This has been her main source of income since graduating from Vancouver Community College’s jewelry design program about seven years ago, after running her jewelry line part-time while completing a bachelor of fine arts from Emily Carr University. While Brooks began selling her pieces at consignment boutiques throughout Vancouver, her business has since grown into a wholesaling operation that sells through stores in Canada, the USA, Japan and Russia. And though she still attends pre-holiday season shopping venues like Refresh, Brooks’ business has taken a shift from craft fairs and wholesale towards online in recent years, due in part to her two young children.
“I found an online store was the perfect outlet to still make my jewelry available to clients and allow me to stay at home with my children,” she said. “Being a jewelry designer is really all I could ask for from a career. It allows me to be creative, passionate and independent and make my own schedule.”
The flexible schedule that accompanies being your own boss is also a perk for Mandy Michals, another Squamish resident who’s paving her way in the crafting world with her eco-friendly, handmade baby and nursery accessories line Bushel + Peck.
Inspired by music and the outdoors, her products typically begin with stock images.
She then alters them, changing colours and adding hand-drawn details to create one-of-a-kind prints. She designs patterns on the computer before sending them to a manufacturer in the U.S. to print the fabrics she uses to craft each product.
A college fashion design grad, Michals came up with the venture in January of this year, partly as a way to spend more time with her now 18-month-old daughter, as well as a way to get her hands on quality, handmade baby products she was having trouble finding from major manufacturers.
“When you get pregnant everything starts to revolve around the baby,” she said. “[Bushel + Peck] kind of evolved out of what I need myself, as a mom.”
As it turns out, a lot of other parents must have the same needs as Michals. Her business has grown rapidly over the past 10 months, surpassing all of Michals’ expectations.
Like McCrone, Michals’ credits this success to Squamish’s highly supportive community of artisans and entrepreneurs. She’s gotten involved with a group called the Squamish Makers Collective, a group of five “mompreneurs” including Michals who make kids and baby products.
“The support I’ve received from those women has just been amazing in terms of inspiration,” she said, adding that local shops like children’s boutique One Small Room – and their customers – have played an important role in her success, as well.
“They were the first shop that started carrying me, and the owner, Christine [Becker], has been so supportive,” Michals said.
“There seems to be such love and support [in Squamish] for local, handmade products.”
Looking to browse through McCrone’s, Brooks’ and Michals’ products? All three vendors will be selling their products at Refresh Market on Nov. 18 and 19.
