Raw Materials Reconnoitering

This post was written in May but has only just made it onto Blogger.

It was really more of a wish than a plan - come up to Paris and find some really cool fournisseurs for bits and bobs for my aprons.  Clignancourt and Montreuil were a bust but this morning I went to Vanves and found some great stuff.  I don't think I paid too much although I didn't really haggle that much either.  The great thing is that I've made some cool contacts with at least 3 stall holders.  I'll probably have to go back and do the maths though to see what my pricing is like, but I dont mind charging a lots for an apron made of antique lace - all the lace I've bought is really quite beautiful.  But I really do need that visiting card so I think that will need to be the priority when I get back and to make sure that its done and printed before we leave for Littlehampton so that I can start dishing it out in the UK, because I'll probably find other fournisseurs there too.

I'm also ruminating about the mantras thing, and someecards and the fact that I could probably put together some pithy feminine sayings and have a photo of my apron somehow as an illustration and get them going viral.  I think I need to check out vintage life again and see if I can't find something, otherwise I've got those quotes I saved from the calendar - Ideally they need to be on someone - I could possibly photoshop the aprons onto an illustration.  The idea of a photo shoot gets pretty complicated when you think about wardrobe (haha other than the apron, that is) 

I might actually be thinking of several different "cards" at this point.  On the one hand there are the slightly saucy ones and "women with attitude" stuff that could, eventually go onto Glamour Aprons fb and get shared around whereas I did want a postcard to pop into the package explaining that its OK to get an apron - so, that's not the same. Then there's the photo shoot which could just be plain gorgeous and wouldn't need pithy comments.  I wonder if I could get away with photos on the mannequin with the pithy comments. The easiest thing would be to do illustrations.  The photo shoot is annoying because I should know someone who could do the modelling for me and then we could just have fun one afternoon dressing up and taking photos.  The only person I can think of is Carol and I think she'd be too self conscious. I'd need to lose some more weight (but maybe not that much more)  

Essentially I could put together 10 sayings for 10 photos with a mise en scene to go with it then I'd just have to parachute in the model, i'd need to think about what the apron would be worn with (never blatantly saying "you can wear them naked") - ridiculous really, I should know someone and then I think "well, since its going to be your clothes and your props why don't you do a Cindy Sharman and photograph yourself" strictly speaking there's no harm in trying and since it'll all start with the saying, that'll be quite cool - after all Cindy Sharman exposed at the Jeu de Paume.  I don't want to be stick thin and wouldn't want a thin nor a young model anyway, so maybe I do fit the bill.  Would be fun trying anyway. 

Need to make the gorgeous new aprons first so that gives me time to shed a few extra pounds…I think Ragnar could help with lighting and things like that.

So I need to get the lovable aprons done, only 3 anyway, the utility aprons, 3 again and the glamour aprons - although I'm sort of thinking that the photo shoot should just be Glamour Aprons.  I suppose the lovable and utility aprons can double up on the quotes and scenarios, even the outfits…

I need to get in touch with Loic and order thread, bias binding, rickrack, satin ribbon possibly…maybe try to source these myself on the web. possibly even some industrial lace. Just stuff that I can bung on à tout bout de champ!

Onwards and Upwards!

So, what's being going on this week?  Oh yes, I was challenged to wear one of my own aprons to the Sunday lunch I hostessed last weekend.  I thought it was quite a valid point so I did.  I ended up wearing Hedy and loving it.  I took the photo somewhat drunkenly after the event but it did look lovely.  However my short crocheted dress did make me realise that I need to make a few aprons that will work with short dresses…Its also got me mentally going through my wardrobe wondering which apron for which outfit…are those glamourous photos going to turn up on the horizon soon? In any case this ain't one of them...

Now, where were we?  Oh yes, last week I managed to get the right photos in the right places and posted the most dreadful french version of my Etsy pitch on my shop in the spirit of "get something up there".  The plan for that one is to become part of the French Etsy community and then do an exchange deal where I check a French shopkeeper's English and they check my French - of course that sort of relies on equal abilities in the 2 languages and equal work load… maybe not such a good idea.  I'm in France for goodness sake! this really shouldn't be that hard to deal with so I'll move on with a mental "note to self" to get that sorted soooon.

So the new aprons "Belinda", "Gwendoline" and "Evie" finally made it into the shop and so to the world!  "Racquel" didn't make the grade in the end and will remain a curiosity made from a recycled fur coat. I didn't want to stir up an ethical storm and anyway the fur was so old it really was falling apart.

So, my little social empire has a few foundation stones and a lot of ambition.  I'd like to find some sort of "news" story about aprons for the FaceBook page and I suppose the Google+ page although that's still the mystery it was last week, maybe I can get to the bottom of that this week?

That's Feedly, FB, Google+, maybe Twitter, no, definitely Twitter (I'll do that this morning too!) Pinterest, FlickR and of course Etsy.  I'm thinking a little Tumblr activity wouldn't go amiss either.

I need to be looking after the shop a bit and sorting out this Treasury lark which looks like a lot of fun and basically getting to grips with marketing on both Etsy and Pinterest - I've been getting emails about this stuff so maybe now I need to pay a bit more attention.

And then, of course there's the merchandise!  Mustn't forget that.  I've been worrying about sourcing my fabrics for a while now and have done a tentative search for vintage fabrics on line but, the bottom line is that I don't think that's going to work for me.  I need to feel the fabric and see it move really, and a lot of the time its the fabric that inspires the garment so…. I've decided that I need to get serious about "brocante" and start systematically going to any that are announced locally.  I've already scoped out fabric shops in my nearest big city I'm now going to be searching farther a field and, of course, there'll always be Paris.  So I won't worry about that too much.

I'd like to get the packaging looking really lovely and find some nice boxes for the ultimate  gift experience.

Oh yes and the new product line!  I've decided that I want to make ties too!  This makes the fabric sourcing even more difficult but I think that's the whole point.  I've been sewing for years - practically all my life and the reason why I stopped a few years ago was that I got fed up of not being able to find the right fabrics… I'm thinking now that I just didn't try hard enough.  And of course I've always got the option of making my own fabrics - for the ties at least.  Its strange how the ties and the aprons seems to belong together, both part of the cocktail era somehow.

More Pinterest!

Phew! That was a bit of an absence.  It was only supposed to be for a week, although, in retrospect I suppose  I should have mentioned that I was popping off, indeed I would have if I thought anyone was reading this.  2 weeks ago the weather was gorgeous and, I have a big garden to deal with so I took a "garden break" to try to steal a march on the weeding and planting etc.  Other people go on proper holidays this is what I do.  Holidays for me constitute limiting my time on the computer so that's what I did... for 2 weeks.

I couldn't, however stop my urge to make aprons so, the next four are ready for launch.  Haha launch means actually taking their photos, hasn't been done yet but the photo studio is up and nearly running - that might be what gets posted here, the photo studio.  According to my book I can even furnish videos of my my work space and methods etc.  Well, for anyone remotely interested, drop me a line!

My little photo studio

It turns out that making aprons isn't the only work on my horizon.  I finally decided to create a business account for Glamour Aprons on Pinterest and that has opened up a whole giant can of worms in the form of how I'm supposed to be doing things and general tips and advice floating all over the place and, yes, you've guessed it, I need to spend some time getting to grips with Pinterest.  Good job I've already got Blogger under my belt, eh?

The way I see it, Etsy is turning out to be the shop, Pinterest should perform as my shop window and this little space here performs the function of Me in my shop.  So, in that respect why would people want to visit this blog other than to get to know me and my ethos for my aprons?  If I were out there in the real world with my shop full of aprons I wouldn't be offering another service to my clients just to get them to come into the shop, would I?  So why would I do that on the web.  This is a reference to my previous blog about making gift suggestions to stop this blog being just me burbling on about creating a web presence.

Just as well really, since that idea wasn't going to fly anyway.  Its my mum's birthday next week and I've just had a really difficult time working out what to get her.  That is something that other people, not least my little sister, come to think of it, have a gift for, not me.

So, the idea of the blog and Pinterest is to drive people to my Etsy shop and get them to buy aprons from it.  Of course I have to add to that Facebook and Google+, StumbleUpon, Twitter and I have signed up for but am only mildly interested in Tumblr (I think its out of my age bracket).  Oh yes there's Flickr too.

Essentially, anyone who's looking for aprons I've probably got it covered, even just carrying on as I am here should manage OK for the apron people since I will wax lyrical about the history of aprons and all the wonderful things about aprons, as I am coming to discover.  Which is probably what I'd talk about if you came in to see me in a physical shop.  I'd talk about the inspirations and why I make aprons, wouldn't I?

Of course, because I'm an antisocial sort of a girl if I went into an apron shop I would hope that the shop assistant would leave me alone to look around... OK so that's what I'm going to do, I'll try creating a post for every apron and explaining in more detail than is available on Etsy about that apron....

So, fine, people who know that they are looking for an apron they'll probably find me but what about the ones who don't know that they're looking for one of my aprons?  Well, I dare say if I'd got that one sussed I would already be a millionnaire and not pondering the question on blogspot.

Sweating Blood Here

Note the big gap in blog entries - that's because I have been doggedly trying to put some social media buttons on this thing! But I have not given up and finally, yesterday, I managed with the help of someone on the Blogger forum, oops I should, at least, have credited him here. I'm really sorry, whoever you were, but I can't find you back - unless you're in my history... hang on...found you Deepak Kamat! here's your link https://www.blogger.com/profile/09720758850729600278 and you truly saved my bacon with "Social Media icons - Making it inline." You and Martin Leblanc at Iconfinder.com and his blog "How to add social media icons to your gmail signature" have allowed me to produce that nifty little line of icons at the top right of my bar to the right.

I am inordinately proud of this and those little icons lead to all my other web presences, which, hopefully, will be of interest to you, my reader. That is, of course if you're interested in aprons, and, more specifically interested in glamourous, silly, sexy and pretty well more decorative than useful aprons.

Of course this is the strategy as mapped out by my book but I shall explain for anyone who hasn't dabbled where I have.

I make aprons out of vintage fabrics and off cuts and generally anything that inspires me. My aprons pay lip service to the idea of the 1950's hostess apron that I think is pretty sexy and how the happy owner of one of my aprons decides to wear my apron is entirely up to him or her. Indeed I learned a long time ago that its best not to explain your art, people who like what you do have their own understanding of what you do and its best not to disillusion them. So I don't explain my aprons, they are what they are.

I offer them up for sale on Etsy.com where I have my own shop called GlamourAprons and where I can accept credit card and payment by eBay. Cool. Ah, I haven't mentioned this before, but I live in France so any purchases will be despatched from France with the incumbant postage fees.

My blog here is to give a more human aspect to the GlamourAprons shop, possibly even represents a sort of shop assistant. I can of course be contacted via Etsy (they call it a convo), but, here you get to know me a bit better, and what my aprons and I are getting up to. So really, you get to know a bit more about my product too.

I have set up a page on Facebook for Glamour Aprons although I'll admit that at this point I don't really know what to do with it just yet.

Next to that is the button to my Google+ page which, at the moment just shows posts from here but in time, that too will have apron relevant stuff on it. I am hoping to use news feeds to post on both Facebook and Google+ but up until now I haven't really found anything that entertaining about aprons, after all there's only so much you want to read about Grandma's apron and how you remembered her at the kitchen sink and, as I have already mentioned, my aprons aren't really about that. I may need to get imaginative here. But that's the next job now that I've sorted out those Icons.

The St Patrick's day Sexy Hostess Half Apron

The next button is for my Flickr page - for anyone who doesn't know Flickr is a photo sharing site so I am using it for photos about my aprons (as opposed to the 5 "packshots" per apron allowed on Etsy), how I make them and anything that I feel is worth taking a photo of - like, for example, the half made St Patrick's apron, upstairs that's waiting for a bit of inspiration and that I'll post here too.

The final button is for Pinterest. Pinterest is a wonderful universe for anyone who loves looking, almost a visual odyssey I think it can best be described as a collection of digital scrapbooks. My sister introduced me to it and it wasn't until I wanted to see some examples of vintage aprons that I really got hooked. My relevant board for here is called Apronerie and I have pinned to it aprons that I like or patterns that I think might be useful and even the odd photo of women of the fifties wearing their aprons just a whole bunch of lovely things really, and, of course my own aprons.

Since I'm only in the beginning throes of all of this, although I have opened a Twitter account, I really don't know what to do with it, so until I start tweeting, and more's to the point, find something interesting to tweet about I'm not providing a link to that.

And then of course, there's here, which in true Blog tradition is just me burbling on about whatever I have to say on any given day, with the proviso that it has something to do my aprons or trying to promote them or sell them.

Now this little diatribe has got the juices flowing about alternative points of interest for Facebook and Google+... watch this space.