Looking Back: Our Weekend at the Queer Arts Festival!
Festival Season!
Festival season was in full swing this past weekend here in Vermont, and what an incredible weekend it was! We spent a day with our vendor tent out at the Queer Arts Festival near Barre, Vermont, and the energy, community, and conversations made all the hard work leading up to it completely worth it.
Getting Ready for the Event
I thought I’d give you an idea of the process to prepare for this event.
First, I needed a tent to display our pottery and quilts under. I found the perfect Crown Shades 10x10 Pop-Up Canopy Tent from Wayfair. It was 10’ x 10’ and easily set up. The only thing it didn’t include was sand for the bags used to stabilize it in the wind. Fortunately, a friend had a sandbag that I used, but you can find bags of sand at Lowe's or Home Depot. I already had the folding tables needed for displaying our various wares; they are HDX 6-ft Rectangular Folding Utility Tables from Home Depot. They were perfect—easy to collapse and set up.
Bringing It All Together
Curating the Collection
Sifting through the existing collection to select standout pieces, balancing new experimental glaze combinations with tried-and-true favorites. Well… that actually sounds easier than it was. I knew I wanted to bring my rainbow cups, so I took the time to make sure I had 20 of them ready. It required a lot of preparation, but it turned out to be worth it. Many sold! After the rainbow mugs, I wasn’t sure what else to bring, so I brought a little bit of everything. I know that sounds vague, but if you look at my collections on my website, you’ll see that I explore a lot of different areas with my ceramic art. In reality, I just picked cool pieces that I like and that wouldn't carry high price tags.
Rainbow Mugs Fresh from the Kiln
Streamlining Pricing
Figuring out how to price everything was another major task. Knowing I wanted what I brought to sell and that I would not have to worry about shipping enabled me to price the works a bit lower. I also did not want to tag every single item individually. Instead, I grouped the ceramics into clear price tiers of $15, $25, $30, $40, and so on in $10 increments up to a maximum of $70. Packing them into separate boxes with simple signage under each group made setup much easier. On the surface it sounds simple, but pulling it all together while my partner and I were both racing against the clock right up to the day of the event took hours and hours of work. Collaborative Booth Setup
Teaming up with my partner, TommyD, to bring a vibrant mix of handcrafted pottery and beautiful handmade quilts all together in one space. It was so much fun for both of us to work out the display. We hung his quilts on the back and sides of our tent, which added a wonderful contrast in texture, interest, and color to the pottery. Personally, I really loved the combination—though I admit I might be a little biased!
The booth setup with both My pottery and Tom’s colorful quilts.
Connecting Face-to-Face
Connecting face to face with fellow art lovers, friends, and supporters made all the effort worthwhile. There is a special kind of magic in packing up the car and heading out to share your art in a live setting. It is always exhausting labor, and we definitely needed a few days to recover this time around. But seeing how people light up when they interact with the pottery and quilts in person is deeply fulfilling.
Thank you!
A huge thank you to everyone who stopped by our booth this past weekend to say hello, support handmade art, and chat about all things creative.
What summer events or creative milestones have you been celebrating lately? Let me know in the comments below!
