Open Studios tour

A few local artists in town organized a Williamstown Open Studios Tour. We gathered nine artists who were interested in participating and sent out press releases, printed flyers, and set up a FaceBook page.  We let all our friends and family know through email - and then set about cleaning our studio's. It's like knowing you have company coming - a good excuse to clean. We should do a tour twice a year just to have an excuse to clean the studio!

There are no before photo's so it will be hard to tell, but the studio is neater and cleaner than it was two days before the tour. With balloons on the mail box, doors of the studio and house it looked festive. There were cookies, water, grapes, trail mix and lemonade on tables but few people helped themselves to the snacks and drinks.

The studio - 20' x 20' former 2 stall barn.

Entering the studio...

It's interesting to answer questions and see what strikes people. Most asked about the design process and the construction of the studio. There were a few samples of small work that they could touch, and a large piece of dyed fabric. It seemed hard for them to visualize that all of my work and fabric started as white and then was dyed. Next time I'll have some fabric in the process of being dyed to demonstrate the technique. Here are some photo's of the way the studio was set up:

Fiber Now magazine open to a page that featured my "Circus Time" quilt and my resume.

Cookies, samples of small work, postcards and business cards, and small pieces for touching and showing techniques.

My wall of fabric, cutting table and drawers full of tools.

Hand dyed scarves for sale -

Office area

Sewing table, ironing station and thread cabinet

By the end of the day, I looked around and realized how overwhelming the studio might be to someone who isn't as visually oriented. The walls have family photo's, inspiration photo's, samples of techniques and small pieces of work on them. I can see most of my tools - fabric, paint, brushes, stabilizers, etc. Someone else could set it up very differently - but it's working for me so far.

Next post will show how displayed work in the house. It seemed helpful for people to see how the work looks in a living room. Thanks for looking!