The Girl in the Button Bin

Hi there!  This is my first post in a while and it’s going to be a long one, so bear with me.  First, I’d like to explain my title.  I’ve been thinking a long time about art, my life, and my design career.  Another artist said something that profoundly woke me up to the possibility that I have been missing something so obvious.  She said, go back to the beginning and think about what makes you happy.  Drawing, color, painting are all obvious answers, but one of my happiest memories is of a button bin.  It was a great big barrel of buttons at a fabric store that I went to often with my mom when I was little as she looked for fabric for her next project.  I would spend my time looking through this giant button bin making different color matches, seeing how many of the same buttons I could find or just playing with them.  I was a girl looking at all the possibilities. As I got older, though, I had to figure out what I wanted to do for work.  I love art and drawing, but I was plagued with the thought of becoming a “starving artist” and so I determined that I would become a graphic designer.  It seemed a good fit since I am a creative problem solver and it allowed me to make a living.  I absolutely LOVE helping clients with logos and collateral and achieving their companies vision.  What I realized is that there’s more I want to do.  One  day over a year ago I discovered an artist named Jessica Swift.  She is an amazing painter and self taught surface pattern designer.  I am totally inspired by her work and attitude toward life.  After looking at her patterns I realized…I want to do that.  It was like a voice that had been calling to me all along, but I had no idea what surface pattern design was really.  I had a high school friend who mentioned that was her major in college, but that was the only inkling I had that it existed as a career.  Jessica Swift offered a class in stamp making.  I was so excited at the chance to take a class with her and thought stamp making would lead me in the right direction but she is in Portland Oregon, so that was out of the question, since I am on the east coast.  I found myself wishing that she would teach pattern design online.  Amazingly she announced that she was going to teach an online pattern camp in October.  The two day boot camp was eye opening.  I created my first repeat pattern and met so many wonderful like minded artists just like myself.  Combining drawing, painting and the computer is exactly the kind of food I needed for my creative soul and I feel like the girl in the button bin once again.

After Jessica Swift’s patterncamp, I took a five week course with The Art and Business of Surface Pattern design’s Make It In Design Module 1, and I am looking forward to enrolling in more classes in the coming year.  This latest surge of creative energy has made me think of more and more projects!  I can’t wait to see what 2015 brings.  You can see one of my designs featured on Make It In Design’s designer showcase!!  And I will be joining one of my classmates, Stephanie Nash with a pattern a week in 2015 (#52PATTERNS2015). I posted a design on Spoonflower this week which will be my first of the 52 patterns. Some of my designs can be found in my online store and hopefully I will have exciting news to share with you about where else you can find them!!

Thank you Pattern Camp and Make It In Design!