I Made a Store: A Tale of 2 1/2 Months Without Sunlight
Submitted on the last day, because as my aunt says, “I put the PRO in procrastination!"
The NEW CreatorsCouture.com is on > http://creatorscouture.com/
As my title suggests, after spending the previous 5 months staying with or near friends around Europe (travel/working of course), I have been holed up at my family’s home in Missouri for the last two and a half months, furiously working on my passion project. Personal grooming and social interaction be damned (my pajama game is on POINTE), I was determined to get this dream off the ground!
The idea was to take trends and inspiration from the haute couture and designer runways and translate them into my own unique illustrations and designs, and then create products ‘real people’ could buy. I wanted to take some of that magic and excitement that comes with the absolute highest level of fashion, and make it accessible to the rest of us, who perhaps can’t swing by Paris and pick up the latest creations.
Another thing that developed naturally with this idea of ‘couture,’ was personalized products. Personalized products have not evolved at the same rate as trends in other products. They are still using the same hideous curly monogram slapped on some bag that isn’t necessarily the style you would normally carry. Even so called ‘high end’ monogram products like you see by some fancy ‘paperie’ boutiques leave me unimpressed… the paper might be quality, but so often I see nothing but a simple letter, which is in reality just a font. Oh yes… it’s all so elegant, it's all so minimal, it's all so... ORDINARY!
My site is called 'Creators Couture' because I am inspired by couture fashions, and I want to put the craftsmanship and WORK back in creating beautiful designs. By definition, 'couture' is rare, unique and takes TIME to create, which is why I spend so much time creating all of these very special illustrations and designs. Taking the time to hand illustrate letters out of wheat or create seamless initial patterns out of chain letters (that I also illustrated myself) isn't necessarily the most sane idea, but I just can't help myself! My love affair with fonts and letterforms needs an outlet, and this is definitely scratching my itch! I love creating really special, custom designs that are anything but #BASIC!
Finally, I want to inspire and be inspired, which is why I am hard at work creating free resources for designers as well as tutorials I think will be useful to others. I want my site to be not just a commerce site, but an inspiration hub for other creators and designers.
The joke around the house for the last month has been, “So when is ‘the launch?” Of course, the punchline has been, “Monday of course!” Even I was surprised at how much time and effort something like this takes to get off the ground. For every fun thing I did, I did just as many tasks that I completely despised: writing and revising a seemingly infinite amount of copy, deciding on and creating a license agreement for my products for designers, setting tax codes and figuring shipping integration, making mockups from scratch (ok that wasn’t so awful, just time consuming), setting variants and price options, and installing and uninstalling oh-so-many shopify apps to find just what I needed for my shop.
I finally took the password off my site and officially ‘launched’ ONLY THIS WEDNESDAY, just in the nick of time to submit my ‘Fight Procrastination’ entry!
After ALL of this creative euphoria, mixed with struggle, and seasoned with sleepless nights, discovering I had a typo on EVERY. SINGLE. DISPLAY. IMAGE. after that launch… PRICELESS!
to be continued...
