After two days of really annoying people on the phone at work this is how I feel. Wish I had a little of arc's fog rolling over me.

The Plush You event at Schmancy is around the corner. There are so many amazing people participating, it’s wild. And this list is only the people who have websites. Kristen has a blog and here are a couple of the people without websites and here is another.

Kristen is amazing. She is putting on this great show with people all over the world participating. (Although I am proud to say I’m the only one from New York!!) Just getting everyone organized is crazy. I can’t imagine what stress she must have been under. Glad it wasn’t me! I only wish that I would be able to make it out to Seattle and see all of the amazing things that are going to be there.

I don’t even know what inspired me to join up. I had never made any sort of plush thing before. And the great thing (for me) was that Kristen didn’t ask what we would be making. When I signed up I had no idea what I would be making. And then I thought of robots. I thought robots aren’t soft and I did a tiny little sketch and voila Felix came to life. Good thing I planned on making him kind of patchworky, because I was working from nothing. No pattern, no sewing machine. Just my two little hands. And I loved it. I loved the way he turned out and I love what is happening with new guys.

Although I am going to have to put them on hold for awhile, because Beck Wheeler is helping with another show down in Australia called “life’s a stitch…” and asked the Plush You people to join up. They are having a Festival in Newcastle. They are building little sets for the plush creations. One of the set is a teashop and the other is a lab with all white creatures. I started my sketches and I am excited about working with a theme!!

Check out all of the really amazing and talented creations:

• Amy Proff Lyons / Texas
• Amy Rue / Georgia
• Ariana Marinelli / California
• Beck Wheeler / Australia
• Camilla Engman / Sweden
• Claire Robertson / Australia
• Clarity Miller /
  Washington
• Corinne Dean / Kentucky
• David Huyck / Wisconsin
• Eireann Lorsung / Minnesota
• Emerald / London
• Erin Shafkind /
  Washington
• Faythe Levine /
  Wisconsin
• Heidi Estey / Washington
• Heidi Kenney / Pennsylvania
• Jenny Harada / Ohio
• Jeremy Read / Washington
• Jess Hutchinson / California
• Kate Sutton / U.K.
• Krissy Harris / California
• Lisa Congdon /
  California
• Lizette Greco / California
• Lori-Lyn Hurley / Texas
• Maria Samuelson /
  Indiana
• Mark Hundley /
  Arizona
• Melissa Lound / Washington
• Mai Le / California
• Mia Hansen / Canada
• Minoji / Japan / Two
• Monique Duke/Moki /
  New Mexico
• Mr. Eyeball / Taiwan
• Rebecca Kaufman / Illinois
• Renetta Sitoy / Washington
• Rhya Tamasauskas / Canada
• Rita Volpi / Ohio
• Robert Hardgrave /
  Washington
• Sara Lanzillotta / Washington
• Susan Kelly/Luminant Studio
  / California

We did it.
I really don’t know how.
No of us do.
But the client called and he loves the backdrops. Everyone does. Hopefully it will be on the cover of October’s issue of Interview magazine. More often than you would imagine the story gets trashed. Don’t like the hair, make-up is wrong, photos too daring and everyone’s work never sees the light of day. Interview is a risk-taking magazine, so hopefully this one will stick! We have had a couple of magnificent backdrops that we painted for one of the big magazines and they didn’t like the hair, so no story. All of that work, all of that money and nothing to show for it!! This business is pretty strange. Sarah tries not to really know what we are painting for, but I like to know so I can keep up our portfolio up to date and keep changing the front page of our website.

Here is a photo of the studio after chaos has left. We are painting at the far end of the studio.

Now Johanna and I are sitting in the office, tying to stay cool and recuperate from the two crazy days and what comes in the door, but the mail person a package for ME. And it is from the incredible and amazing Martha of Naive Knitting. I am in awe of her. She has a series called “Boxing Monday’s” that is coming to a close, but you must watch her slideshow. The boxes are only four & a half inches square, but packed with incredible words and items. Delicate, marvelous and thought provoking.
Love them.
Thank you so much Martha.
She deserves a prize back, I’ll have to wait and see what creation of mine she is interested in!
Here is a picture of ‘my’ amazing little boxes. There is a great little finger print under the word clue. LOVE THEM!!!!

Folks it looks like me might make it!

Sarah putting starch on the backdrop. (Starch instead of gesso, so the photographer can backlight it) We use a push broom because it works so much faster!

The clients came by this morning and checked out the almost finished (because they have changes) tunnel drop that we started yesterday. The second (and larger drop is in the very beginning stages underneath.

They are discussing the colors and I thought these feet were great. Sarah has the lovely string coming off from her. (Sorry about the blurriness, but I was trying to be inconspicuous)

Here is Johanna mixing some yellow or orange for the fireball thing. Check out the stack of buckets that she has been washing.

Here is beautiful Shadow. Sarah is speeding to the finish on this second backdrop. She is really really amazing.

How cute is Buddy? He is Sarah’s other dog. This is right after he had his afternoon greenie. (Shadow is waiting for her greenie in the photo above.) Pretty much like crack for dogs.

***addition…we are working in obsense conditions. It is crazy hot here 95 degrees with the humidity making it feel like it is over 100 degrees…which wouldn’t be bad except we ONLY have an air conditioner in the office. That means in the studio were we WORK it is a million degrees. Our eyelids are sweating, YUCK!****

It has been dead at work. No one calling, no one coming by and then wham, an hour after my post yesterday we began the slam!
I said that we can paint fast and I meant it. A client (who we like, thankfully) called to order two custom backdrops by Thursday night. Mind you it is one p.m. on Tuesday afternoon and he isn’t going into a production meeting until five p.m. That mean we can’t start until after a morning meeting. One of the backdrop is 12′ x 30′ and the other is 16′ x 30′. These are big, even for us. The physical possibility of getting this done by Thursday night is cutting it close to say the least! It is going to be pretty much impossible to finish by normal closing time. The job is for Interview Magazine.
Yesterday we ordered some fabric and Johanna put one coat of gesso on it before we left. Otherwise we would be in a world of hurt. Because the thing that takes the longest, is actually the drying time. I wasn’t there for the morning meeting, but they filled me in when I arrived. The smaller image is this sort of lighted underground tunnel.
Here is Johanna and Sarah working on measuring it out.

The other image in a flame-like thing. As of writing we haven’t even started on it.

Now as fun as that is I get to deal with some fun corporate bank stuff. We eat at FoodWorks pretty much almost everyday and they called to let me know that they had not received my check for last month. I knew I had paid it because that is one (of my many) jobs to do! I looked at out returned checks and it was cashed BUT to a totally different company. I had to walk over to Chase and talk to our account manager who is like 12. He was super great though, we had to talk to two different claim departments. Regular fraud is different from Endorsement fraud. Who Knew? They are supposed to call me back tomorrow. I have never had any experience with this sort of fraud before. (I did get the stolen identity thing and that is pretty awful. They tried to buy a computer!! - another story - sorry, sorry sidetracked) I am looking at it as kind of an adventure through Corporate World….

Here we are frantically trying to dry the base at 4:30pm. Time is not on our side, but we will win the battle! (hopefully)

I work at a painting studio, but we paint backdrops. Huge ones. Well, large scale at least. Usually their 10’, 12’ or 14’ high and can be pretty much any length. We paint almost anything. From generic “backyards” to single colors to cartoon city streets to blue skies. The studio has about 1200 backdrops in stock. And that is the main part of my job. I handle the rentals. When people call, I answer the phone. I get the backdrops where they need to go, be it downtown or Los Angeles.
The people that call are the photographers themselves, art directors, stylists, and photo editors. They all ask the same first question, “Do you rent backdrops?” I think it is hilarious, but that is because I hear it at least once a day.
We do things for fashion designers – for the runway shows. mav’s Gary Graham actually called us up to rent a backdrop for his invite. (He is super nice byt the way!) The photographer, Christian Larsen did a superb job. See:

And here’s what the backdrop looks like another way, publicity shot by Jeremy Leibman for The Pages:

We paint fast. Which is surprising because there are only three of us that work in the New York Studio (Sarah’s business partner Adelaide works in Vermont). Sarah has been doing this for over 20 years now. So she is pretty quick. And Johanna is an awesome assistant. We can turn out anything in a matter of days, although we would prefer a little breathing room. Sometimes the jobs are crazy last minute and we work our asses off.
I am going to do a little photo essay of the studio for a about a week. So you can see how we work (we’re pretty messy). And see how strong we are (we carry 10’ backdrops like no ones business). If you have questions let me know. Email me or write them in the comments. I’ll try to answer them, because I have a habit of assuming (and you know how that turns out) people automatically know what I am talking about!