Artisan's Diary: 17.02.25

Going off piste and managing to find the way back.

As a self-taught artisan, and team of one, I learn everything through trial and error. When I started in 2021, all I knew was that I wanted to write letters to people and there were no colourful or joyful stationery options. It was mainly a sea of pastels and I wanted something more visually impactful. So I started making, doing, creating. This was purely for my own needs and desire to connect with people during Covid, when connection was distant. I craved a more intimate experience, a physical object that would reach them, with my writing on it; something they could hold in their hands when we couldn’t be in the same room.

A passion developed. I made more and more and more. I wanted them to be ethically made and high quality. I kept going. I made a site. I made an Instagram page. I wrote to people.

Now I’ve been at it for nearly four years, slowly chipping away. Part-time because I chose to be a stay at home mum. It’s been a slow build, not least because, I’ve been learning as I go. Trying things out and realising what works and what doesn’t. This has meant painfully slow progress, sometimes in the wrong direction.

I’ll give you an example. This week I was working on my packaging. It doesn’t sound very exciting but actually I realise I underestimated its importance. Or rather, I started out with my north star, and then looked around too much at what everyone else was doing and thought I needed to be lighter, smaller and cheaper. Time is money and every second should be paid for – or so every small business course will tell you. This is true but if you verge away from your own north star, there is no difference between you and everyone else. And your difference is what makes your work unique to you.

So, I’ve come full circle and am going back to the packaging I started out with. A beautiful, heavy, lidded box that can be kept and repurposed long after the stationery has been written. Or it can be refilled and reused.

My main error though, digging deeper, was thinking about money at the same time as thinking about design, craft or joy. Don’t get me wrong, it is very important for an artisan to think about money. We need to value our work correctly (which I find difficult but am getting better) and learn how to make our craft into a successful business (because we do have bills to pay) but what I have learned is not to think about money at the same time as design itself.

If you do that, your thoughts will run along the line of ‘Will people like this?’ ‘Will this make sell?’ ‘Is this a waste of time?’ instead of ….. silence. Yes, you want to have a silent brain ‘in the flow’. Not a chatty one, questioning and commenting on your every move. That is the truest way to suck the art out of any artistic project. It will veer you towards the mass produced, generic, safe bet, which is the opposite of an artisanal, handmade, and unique object.

That unique object or design is always a little risky - as something new always is - and it is quite possibly not great. But you won’t know that until it is designed and/or made, and only after that should all the right questions be asked.

There are so many doubts that come into a person’s mind when starting a business or project, be that artisanal or otherwise. I am learning to digest my experience and that of others, to understand what will steer me in the right direction. I’m also trying to free my brain of constant chatter (mainly by staying offline) so that it can create, explore, and come up with things that bring me joy, and in so doing, hopefully bring joy to others.

In the end we all have to paddle our own canoe and, as poet Annette Skade said in my interview with her, ‘You have to be strong enough to use your own voice and not disguise it.’