etsy, swissmiss & pottery

When I met swissmiss (aka Tina Roth Eisenberg) the other day she mentioned a new site called Etsy, an innovative e-commerce store setup especially for handmade goods. Etsy makes it easy for anyone to buy and sell handmade goods of every sort. Browsing through the many items for sale you'll see everything from knitted scarves and hats to handmade books, original paintings, stained glass, unique stationary, jewelry, and most recently my pottery! Etsy is one of the best designed web sites I've had the pleasure of exploring and they make it very easy to setup shop and sell your work -- so I did. I haven't had the opportunity to put much online yet, but I do have a few pieces up and ready to be sold. In fact, I already sold a coffee mug to Jan in Arizona. So I've begun on a good note. I encourage you to drop by my Etsy shop and have a look about.

On a related note, swissmiss and her husband Gary were in town on Saturday of last week. They were staying in Park City with friends and dropped into Salt Lake to run errands. We met in Sugar House over lunch, they ate and I had a drink since I had just eaten lunch with Lynn. I met Tina through the online photography community Flickr, where we both share our work. It was interesting meeting someone I've known online for awhile and gotten to know by way of their photographs. She lives in the concrete jungle of New York City. Tina and Gary were both great people and we had a good conversation over lunch.

When Tina and Gary were planning their wedding this past summer I sent them two wheel-thrown mugs I made, along with some packets of Swiss Miss hot chocolate for a wedding present. After the mugs arrived and were unpacked I received this kind message from Tina:

"I almost fell over when I opened your package last night! The mugs are SOOO SOO beautiful! I saw you signed and yes, you told me you to pottery but ... damn.. Sam... these are just georgious! Thank you so so much! You totally made my and Gary's day. We were both smiling all over our faces!"

I must admit I was tempted to keep the mugs since they were awfully nice.

After lunch I invited Tina and Gary to the pottery studio for a tour. We had a look around the studio, I told them something about the process we go through to make pottery and outside we took a few photographs, said our goodbyes and parted ways. I sent them home with an early Christmas present, a medium-sized bowl I'd recently made. It was good to have met them both and if I ever make to New York I expect I'll drop by to visit.