Year of Change: Craft Renaissance
It’s funny how different two points of view can be.
Recently, my wife and I had friends over. One couple brought their mother, who started a conversation with Lisa about her antique dolls. And by conversation, I mean, "Endless rant about the shiftless and worthless people today who are too lazy to do anything by themselves, like in the good old days."
Because, after all, JoAnns Crafts and Fabric was an empty store these days. The magazines they carried were thin shells of themselves. And people in general wanted nothing more than to go out and buy the latest cookie-cutter factory crap, rather than take the time to develop a fun skill that could save them money.
Scandalous! Especially in the whole economic yadayada . . .
"Do you know about Etsy?" Lisa asked politely.
Why no, the lady said. Probably thinking it sounded like a disease she didn’t want to catch.
"That’s a place online where you can sell handmade stuff. It gets something like two and a half million US visitors per month."
The lady didn’t believe it. That couldn’t be happening. Of course the whole craft segment was dying . . .
So we showed her Etsy. We showed her Artfire. We showed her Craft:Zine and its DIY brother, Make:Zine. Together, these sites pull in over six million worldwide visitors per month. They’re full of articles about how to make clothing, jewelry, furniture, lighting, and more. There are hundreds of thousands of people with stores, selling their own wares. And they’re even pushing the edges of 3D printing and CAD-based manufacturing. All done on a micro level, by creative people, typically working at home.
So is it any wonder JoAnns is deserted?
Bottom line: there’s no death of crafting. There’s no end of DIY. The movement has just . . . moved. Online. And it’s gotten bigger, better, more vibrant, and more immediate as it has done so.
