Friday, April 27, 2012

Red Vans love...

I had a lovely message on the blog from Steffie Brocoli who we have featured on the blog before. She makes lovely things. Steffi said she has was wearing the same shoes as me and I said send a photo over! She did. So here is Steffi in her red Vans. Go and have a look at the things she makes. You wont be disappointed.
Have a good weekend.

Anna, CM

Monday, April 23, 2012

A Day In The Life...

So I have been meaning to do this for a while. Claire over at Miso Funky does it and Lee May at Bonbi Forest so when Lee May named the date as Friday 20th April I thought I would join in.
So here is my day in the life...
I woke up at 6 this morning. I am very busy with work at the moment and this makes my brain wake up way before my body!
At 6.30am decide to go out for my morning walk then can't be bothered so I'm still in bed and now waiting for Anthony to finish in the shower. It's now 7.45am. At least I have had breakfast so that's out of the way.
I’m in the studio at 8.50. That’s a late start for me this week I have been in here between 7 and 8 each morning. This morningthough- no way. I try not to do silly hours. I used to when I first started Custom Made but then realised no one was going to give me a medal for doing it! When I am old I’m not going to pat myself on the back for working like a dog. I am going to think about all the cool things I have done. Some of those are work related yes but ONLY working and doing nothing else stops you from doing other cool things.
That’s my pep talk over. Back to work.
I have had three wholesale orders to do this week. I have just dropped the last one off with the fella in the post office (combined with a milk run) who was very surprised to see me at 9.15.
 Ready for the post office!
The post office run is usually 2pm-ish. It’s empty at that time for some reason so it’s my own personal post office. I have a chat with the guy in there. When you work on your own most of the time you have a different set of ‘office friends’ Mine are- the guy in the post office, Nick our post man (who will be here in a while) and three of four neighbours who are pensioners and wander about and do gardening and stuff. Oh I forgot to mention, the Custom Made studio is the ground floor of our house.

Its 10.00 now. I have to finish some stock for tomorrow. I’m doing the designers/makers market in London. Then I have to mull over a print quote and get on with some work for Pulse, the trade fair in June which is looming fast. Listening to Cults. Really like them.  I will talk to you later…
1.30. Well I’m still mulling over the print quote. Thinking about changing the design actually so I will keep that going round in my mind for a while. I’ve finished up all my preparations for tomorrow so that’s good. I actually inadvertently made a new bracelet for the range in the process. That happens sometimes. Design is strange thing. Sometimes these thing just pop into your head. It can happen in the middle of the night though!
Did the website order post office run and this afternoon I’m going to finish a design for a new business card and packaging I started a while ago.

2pm. Oh man what an afternoon.  SO…I really wanted to re-design the Custom Made business cards and ticketing for brooches, necklaces etc. I had had ideas in mind all week and literally everything I tried looked awful. This doesn’t happen very often but when it does there is nothing more frustrating.
Idea  number 857- rrrrrr!!! I can’t stand it. With the chase me studs it looks like willow pattern!
So now its 4.30pm and the best thing you can possibly do when your creative juices aren’t flowing is go and do something else. My something else was ‘throw the towel in’ So that’s what I did, and said hello to the weekend.
So that’s my day in the life. Hope it wasn’t too boring!
Anna, CM 

Monday, April 16, 2012

New in the shop today...

We have a lovely new bag in the shop for you today! Like it? You can grab one RIGHT HERE
Anna, CM

Thursday, April 12, 2012

Instagram update...

So...I am thouroughly enjoying using Instagram. Our account is @custommadeuk. As you can see by the name its supposed to be for Custom Made but I am having a hard time NOT posting other pics (as the bio on our page says!) Hope you dont mind!
Anna, CM

Wednesday, April 04, 2012

Instagram!

So I was rather pleased to learn yesterday that Instagram is now available on Android phones! Yipee! I am very glad to be able to join in. We are custommadeuk and have only posted one photo so far- see above a rather spooky photo of the ever naughty Missy on top of a door.
We will post more very soon...
Anna, CM

Monday, April 02, 2012

Packaging...

Packaging your products can be a minefield! That sounds very dramatic...sorry. Over the years we have tried lots of different methods. I have toyed with a fabric packaging for a while now. Custom Made is all about fabric right?
Anyway I settled on this today. Its a little square of fabric tied with a ribbon, a little wrapping cloth. As you can imagine we have lots of odds and ends of fabric at CM HQ and I cant think of a better way to use them. Its green (it uses scraps of fabric that might end up in the bin) and its rather pretty!
From now on all necklaces purchased in the SHOP will come to you in one of these neat little packages. The fabric will differ, you will get whatever we have, but it will be pretty and the ribbon will match!

Anna, CM
 
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