Happy Monday!
Today marks the very first installment in a new blog series, This Artsy Life, that takes a tiny peek into the everyday goings on of a few of my favorite artists and other creative types.
Our exploration begins with
HeatherJeany, a long time favorite gocco/screenprinting genius of mine. Strangely enough, I discovered Heather's work because I saw pictures of her super nifty business cards somewhere and thought wow, this girl must be super cool to design something like that!
And it turns out that yes,
Heather and her
designs are indeed super cool.
Tell
us a bit about yourself and what you do: My name is Heather Toupin and I make
Gocco screenprinted stationery and wedding invitations under the name
heatherjeany. I started my little business in 2005 while I was working full time
as a textile designer. When I lost that job in 2007 I decided that instead of
trying to find another "real" job I would make heatherjeany my real job and it
was the best decision I ever made. I truly feel like i am living a dream. I love
what I do and I hope it shows.
Walk
us through your average day as an artist: This is kind of complicated for me
because my days really revolve around my son Finn. He's 15 months old so there
is a lot of eating, napping, playing and diaper changing going on, but usually
it goes something like this: we get up around 7am and play together and have
breakfast until about 9am when we go to the gym. Finn gets to play in the
daycare area and this is an important time for me creatively. While I'm working
out and listening to my iPod I have a solid hour to really brainstorm some of
the ideas that I always have swirling around in my head. I'm a thinker. I need a
lot of time to think before I actually put pencil to paper, so this time is very
valuable to me. At 11am Finn goes down for a nap so from 11am to 1pm I usually
work on a series of small tasks like; packing and shipping etsy orders, getting
my house and studio space organized, answering emails, little bits of design
work that I might have pending, tending to my etsy shop; listing and relisting,
photographing new work, and of course updating flickr, facebook and twitter.
After Finn's nap my husband is usually home from working at the coffee shop we
own and we have some family fun time. I also usually try to get in about an hour
of printing in the afternoon. At 7:30pm (when Finn goes to bed) is when my real
work day begins. This is usually when I do the bulk of my printing. I usually
work until about 10 or 11pm. That's sort of an average day. I'm lucky to also
have one or two all-day print fests per week when either Tom or my parents take
Finn for the day and I can go Gocco-crazy :)
What’s your best business tip for
those who are just starting out: Love what you do, like a crazy obsessive love.
I think that's the only way you'll be motivated to put in the massive amount of
time necessary to really have a successful business.
What
inspires you and how do you maintain your creative flow: I'm always thinking,
planning, plotting. I'm very inspired by music, from a very young age my dad
exposed me to a lot of great music. Focusing on a song always puts sort of a
running stream of images in my head. I roll these things around in my head and
sometimes they evolve in good design ideas. I like taking walks and just really
taking things in, nature is very inspiring to me. I love bits of unexpected
bright colors in nature, like the bright yellow goldfinches that have been
coming to my birdfeeder lately. I also feel extremely lucky to be part of an
amazingly creative community here in Providence, RI. I'm a member of a RI
etsy street team as well as being involved in Craftland. Being surrounded by all
these amazingly talented people definitely keeps me excited about making things.
Thanks so much for sharing Heather!
PS--New installments in this series will be posted each Friday :)
