Pop Shop Year End Review 2015

The days in between Christmas and New Years have always been my favorite. It’s a week when nothing happens and you can get ahead. People feel stuffed full of food and well gifted – at least hopefully and start to think about the future. New Years Resolutions have always been my speed. I love making them up. I love sticking with them. The kind of holiday presents I hope for double as New Years Resolutions. These are the kinds of gifts that get me excited. This year for me it’s join a handbell choir, take french lessons (took French for years and forgot everything I knew), and find a yoga studio that I truly connect with.

In business, it’s also the best time to look at back at 2015 and let you know all the exciting news about where we’re going in 2016. And we’ve never been more excited about an upcoming year. But first here’s a look back.

1. The Maker Awards

The Best Makers, Crafters, Artists from Texas | The Indies: Texas Maker Awards | Hosted by Pop Shop America

The Maker Awards are so fun. We want everyone to win and love getting prizes so this annual series is just the best. A couple of things that are changing for The Maker Awards.

We want the Maker Awards to grow. In 2 years, it has turned into one of the biggest things that we do! We’ll be including more people from around Texas and the South/Southwest. We’ll be reaching out to more bloggers, craft fairs, and art festival organizers too. Also, we’ll be hosting this contest a little later that way people can pick up their trophies in person at the Pop Shop Summer Festival. Waiting on addresses and shipping a million small delicate items was not fun in 2015! Lesson learned.

2. The Pop Shop Blog Goes Viral

evil alice costume

Pop Shop’s biggest blogs were Turn Everyday Vintage into Extraordinary Halloween Costumes And Top 5 Classic Video Games You’ve Never Played.

Turn Everyday Vintage was put together by Luz of Vida Antigua. I just asked her about the topic! All of these dresses shown are from Vida Antigua‘s Vintage Clothing Collections and some of them are still available for purchase. She put together all the collages, the concepts, and the hair and makeup styles.In this blog, you can see how much styling and makeup influences the look. We were super excited when this blog went viral and totally get why. Luz is a stylish vintage collector and her clothes are swoon worthy.

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As for the Top 5 Classic Video Games You’ve Never Played, this blog was a collaborative blog with Chris from Insomnia and Deep End Records. I’m a huge nerd and clearly Chris is too! I love this list and get excited about these video games that I’ve never played. I hadn’t heard of any of them before. The games span a variety of different vintage gaming systems like PC, Super Nintendo, and Playstation. I like Chris’ tone in the blog. You can tell how enthusiastic he is towards video games and why Insomnia Video Game Culture Shop is such a cool spot.  They have video game tournaments, art, and fun anime and kawaii style stuff. If you haven’t been I highly recommend it.

3. Shopping Pop Shop’s Handmade Goods

Vintage Airstream Illustration by Hazelmade | Cute Illustrations Greeting Cards | Handmade Card Sets

Our most popular items by far are the workshops! But we’ll talk about that later. Our popular items are different in person from online. Online the most popular products are the Hazelmade card sets. You can now find a few on sale and we’ll be restocking asap! They are blank on the inside, hand illustrated and have that handmade Etsy kind of feel with very modern designs. I just love them.

kitten1Watermelon Tourmaline Stud Earrings

In person, people can’t get enough of the kitten undies + the gemstone stud earrings. These gemstone studs were super hot at Witch Craft and the kitten undies are a silly crowd pleasing favorite. Both are handmade by Pop Shop America / Potions. That’s my label that I created before PSA and a big part of why I started Pop Shop America in the first place.

Hello Lucky also carries these stud earrings, if you want to check them out in person. The kitten underwear are so silly and happy. It’s like a joke that has a million punchlines. Most of them I hadn’t even thought of beforehand. I just love kittens and was making lots of kitten themed items and stumbled onto this. The internet is full of cats and we’re glad to be a part of that – lol.

4. Biggest Pop Ever June 2015

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Pop Shop Houston Festival had record attendance June of 2015. It was insane and we were in the weeds the whole time. That’s an expression for constantly trying to scramble to get caught up which we never did until it was over! Over 8,000 attended this craft fair/art festival/maker faire/music festival. Pop Shop Houston is a combination of lots of fun things and we’re glad to welcome so many people. Here’s a recap of the event.

We want every future Pop Shop to be as fun and lively as the June 2015 Festival. So this year we’ll be expanding VIP Small Bite Tastings, Including More Visual Art, and Using More Outdoor Space. We’ll be back at Silver Street Studios – the best venue in Houston for visual art and cultural events. Pop Shop Houston will always change and have lots of new fresh visual art, things to do, and happy times.

5. Started teaching Craft Workshops at TX/RX Labs

Gilded Animals Craft Workshop at TX/RX Labs April 2015

I can’t believe it hasn’t even been a year since we started teaching craft workshops at TX/RX Labs. Gaby and I had worked together a number of times and we always have a makerspace by TX/RX Labs set up at Pop Shop Houston Festival. We had no idea whether these workshops would be successful or not but they sell out every month! But they’ve been great and we really love teaching them.

We found our groove with teaching pinterest like workshops that are extremely stylish and don’t require a lot of heavy materials or machinery. Which means we can drink lovely cocktails during the workshop! We always make interesting modern and vintage drinks that are delicious and simple. We also snack on tasty bites by Greenhouse Catering Co. And oh my goodness they are good.
candle diy workshop in process

We’ve taught terrarium building, gilded animals, and how to make candles. Our workshops in 2016 are really exciting. We’ll be teaching kawaii jewelry and accessories, how to build a hula hoop and lots of new crafts.

6. Put Mini Pops on Hiatus

leybon at Mini Pops Montrose Market for blog | Mini Pops a Monthly Pop Up Market in Montrose | Art Market Montrose | Craft Fairs Houston

A-ha! Now we’re getting into some juicy bits. What the heck happened to Mini Pops?! It was an amazing two years at Westheimer & Dunlavy. Check out this awesome month or what about this one. Pavement Clothing and Leopard Lounge Vintage were amazing hosts. Ah-maz-ing. But last year we got rained 7 out of 9 months! It was getting crazy rescheduling everything. And as you might have noticed this year is no different. It’s been raining like crazy!

We still work with Leopard Lounge. They had a huge space at Pop Shop Houston Festival. And we have some new plans in the works for 2016. Something even bigger and better. We can’t wait to tell you and will make that announcement soon.

 

7. Hosted the 3rd Annual Mister Man

I love this event! Mister Man is my favorite event and has been since we started it 3 years ago. Mister Man is a men’s shopping event right before Father’s Day and is something that I co-host with Height of Vintage. We’ve always been able to experiment with programming like having burlesque performances and mustache contests. And this is definitely our most adult – boozy – late night shopping party.

This year, things really seemed to gel. We’ve been finding our groove and the party gets more fun and the menswear, men’s shopping, grooming items, vintage and cool stuff has grown and matured over the years too. In 2016, Mister Man is going to grow. We care about this event a lot and want to make it the best.

8. Started a New Event Witch Craft

witchcraft-1

This event was amazing too! Witch Craft was a spooky, creepy, dark kind of pop up that took place right before Halloween at Bohemeo’s. This was a night event too and was an absolute blast. The Tripatorium was set up and is unique music/light/sound experience that was installed at the event.

This event was also co-hosted but this one was hosted with Milk + Honey Vintage who also organizes First Saturdays Montrose. It was cool to create an event with a group of like-minded badasses. Stephanie, Traci and are planning on a spring edition of Witch Craft even as we speak.

9. Taught at Holocaust Museum Houston

dec 5th hmh storytime_Fotor

One of the biggest things that’s grown for us are our workshops. We love teaching and want everyone to feel great and make stylish and professional looking products. We find creativity like this to be totally fulfilling to kids and adults. We’ve taught kids craft workshops at the Houston Public Libraries for over two years and were recently introduced to the Givings Director at Holocaust Museum Houston.

We’ve taught 2 craft workshops at HMH for kids this last fall. We love what the instituation is all about and think that it’s one of the most beautiful buildings in Houston. It has such important place in relationship to other contemporary museums. As the last generation of Holocaust Survivors is aging, it’s important to preserve a legacy of survival and compassion. And it’s important to prevent hate and genocide whenever we can.

Our workshops at Holocaust Museum Houston are workshops that mean a lot to us.

10. Started #crafttalk

crafttalk community for small business promo 2016 | grow your handmade business | small business tips

Crafttalk is a twitter chat for creative and small businesses. We hosted the first one with Brit Charek and Grace Dobush who are putting on the Midwest Craft Con in February. The first #crafttalk took place in September and it was all about how to prepare your creative business for the holidays. As a craft fair and art festival, we learn so many tips on how to have the least amount of stress and make the most amount of money. We’ve been doing this for years and hope to share this knowledge to help small business.

And it’s not just about us. Every small business has something important to say about growing their business. We’re glad to create a community where we can all benefit from each other’s knowledge. Because of Crafttalk, we wrote our first e-book which you can download here. Our next Craftalk Twitter Chat takes place Feb. 9th 8pm CST.

We’re just so filled with excitement about 2016 and hope that you decide to join us at an upcoming event or workshop. Woo-hoo 2016!

Let’s Stay Friends!

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