Bag Lady Enterprises on Etsy.com
Bag Lady’s Attic
My toys are in the attic. It was supposed to be a play room where I could make a mess with my hobbies and it wouldn’t matter. The “mess” part worked exactly as planned, but somehow, the “hobby” part got completely out of control, and “The Bag Lady” came into being.
People have asked why I chose the name “Bag Lady.” Here’s the story:
While shopping in a little boutique in Geneva, Illinois, back in 1998, I found an intriguing little handbag made of interesting tapestry fabric with chains and charms that dangled and made pretty little noises. The label inside said “Urban Gypsy, Indianapolis,” and the tag said “$75”!!
I had to have it, and “justified” the expense by saying something to myself along the lines of…”Hey! I could make these! This would be fun!! I could sell them at craft fairs!! I’ll just use this one as my inspiration.”
If I’d just carried that little bag instead of tearing it apart to see how it was made (notice how all the fun dangly things are missing… and the bottom’s just pinned together for the picture), it would have been cheap at ten times the price. But NO-O-O-O-O. I had to try this myself!
…Three and four yard sections of carefully selected tapestries began to appear on PVC poles on the wall, like in a yard goods store.
Then I started scrounging all the antique stores for great parts for the dangles. But, of course, they were all one of a kind. If I used them, I wouldn’t have them anymore. I thought the bead shops were way too expensive. So, I started ordering catalogues.
But to buy from them, I needed a resale license. I got one.
But after all that, the Bag Lady only ever made three or four different bags. It was the beads and charms and chains that were the most fun. The bags were… well, “bagged” for the beads.
The problem with beads is, it’s very difficult to design anything with them without having many different ones right at your fingertips to choose from. That requires a huge inventory of many different ones in lots of sizes. Okay! I bought…and bought…and bought. Wholesale! Wow, was I ever saving money!!
Pretty soon (but not soon enough), I figured out that I really didn’t want to be in the business of mass producing anything. But now there’s this enormous inventory…
Oh, no. This isn’t all, not by any means! This is just what I keep “at my fingertips.”
Take a look inside the storage closet, where all the “reserve quantities” are stored!
I started selling at shows and giving seminars on making jewelry. But for that, I needed tools for everyone in the class, and then if they wanted to buy them, I’d have to have enough extra for that…
A responsible instructor should know all about jewelry tools and have tried several to know what works best, etc.
Tools I bought before I learned what I needed and what worked.
And more cabinets full of things “at my fingertips”
Well, yes, of course I bought the tools I liked by the hundreds. I wanted to get a good price for my students.
The problem with the shows was that they were just too demanding. I kept getting sick from the stress afterwards. No more shows for me!
Hopefully, you can benefit from what were the biggest problems for me. Kits where you have some options for color and major pieces may be a good solution to what is probably a problem for everybody. It should at least get you started and help you figure out what you like.
Words of advice from The Bag Lady:
1) Don’t ever make yourself a nice, large hobby room. You’ll fill it with “supplies” and get so lost and confused in it all, you won’t be able to actually create anything! You’ll spend half your time trying to find that one bead you know you have… somewhere… And any time left over from that will be spent counting and sorting and trying to organize all the things you do find… scattered in little piles all over your workspace.
2) Don’t EVER get a resale license that enables you to buy wholesale for a hobby! You’re not supposed to buy things by the hundreds for a hobby. Blow the few extra bucks it costs to buy only what you need. (You’ll save a lot of money in the long run)!
3) Don’t try to justify the cost of your creativity with rationalizations along the lines of “…if I made twenty-five of these instead of just one, I could sell them and recoup my expenses and…”
You shouldn’t have to “justify” the cost of developing your creativity and having a little fun in life.
Also, don’t think for one minute that this is how my attic always looks. [And not just because those pictures were taken in 1999, before the attic was remodeled.] It took weeks to get it into that much order – weeks I could have spent creating, if I hadn’t bought everything by the hundreds and made such a colossal mess.
Maybe now that you’ve had a peek into my attic, you’ll understand why it will take me a very long time to get everything up on the site.
Anyway, below is a link to my Etsy site.
Bag Lady Enterprises on Etsy.com
My “Jewels” (High quality glass gems from 1950’s Germany, Switzerland, Austria, and Czechoslovakia). Most shown here are not yet on Etsy (and much of what I have is not yet show shown here). Email if interested.