Over the years of being an indie designer and artist I have met some pretty amazing designers and artists. It seemed like a fun idea to interview some of these talented makers on my blog. When I got this idea there was one maker who was the obvious person to start with, Valerie Soles.
I first “met” Valerie on-line. When I started my first Mellifluous Couture website Valerie was one of my customers. When her order came in her dearbirthday.com e-mail address sounded interesting to me so I went to check it out. I was blown away by her amazing work and was honestly a little intimidated that such an amazing designer was ordering one of my dresses.
Many years later Valerie is still one of my sewing and design idols. Her meticulous detail and amazing combinations of pattern and color never cease to amaze me. I think of it as an honor to count Valerie amongst my closest friends and one of the artists I carry at Tumbleweed & Poppleswamp.
I share a birthday with this cutie!
Who taught you to sew? How did you develop your skills?
My family lived with my mom’s parents for a little while when I was little. Grandma was a seamstress (among other things) and I spent many mischievous hours lurking around the forbidden sewing room, picking up pins and tweaking her Husqvarna Viking machine lustily. I desperately wanted to learn to sew, but she said I was too young. Many years later, I told her on the phone that my best friend Karie and I had started a little sewing business out of her parents’ basement and Grandma packed the Viking up, table and all and had it shipped to me.
Karie and I taught ourselves to sew on machines when we were 15 and 16, but I credit my Grandma for planting the desire in me to learn to make things for myself. Before she sent me the machine, I made dolls’ clothes and even a most horrid, empire-waisted bed sheet princess dress, complete with fake fur trim (for myself, of course) all by hand.
I am still in the developing stage as far as skills go. Being self-taught has obvious limitations and I think I’m probably way behind where I should be, especially with regard to pattern-making, but I also really like the idea of always having something new to learn.
How did your businesses Dear Birthday & Lovelier Seas come into existence?
Dear Birthday started as a way to keep me too occupied to focus on school. I didn’t realize it at the time, but looking back, it’s clear that I was way stressed out by my own overly ambitious schedule (I was double majoring in Biology and Visual Arts) and I used sewing as a sort of meditation. I had absolutely no plans for the project whatsoever–it was all fun in the beginning, which is probably why it was successful. Of course, my measure of success is based less on money than on community and feedback and my own fulfillment. Feeling validated as a maker eventually helped me ditch my double major ambitions and focus on the arts.
In the beginning, Dear Birthday was sold only through my own website, but I eventually consigned with a few handmade shops online (Cut+Paste) and onstreets (Sodafine, Treehouse, and a few others I’ve forgotten!) When my boyfriend Ian and I moved to Brooklyn, I opened an Etsy shop and started to change what I was doing to reflect my new spaces (physical and mental), toning the colors down, and printing our own designs on hand-dyed, organic cottons.
It wasn’t long before we found out we were going to have a baby. The spaces changed again and I mumbled and fumbled away from Dear Birthday and into Lovelier Seas.
What are your biggest challenges as a designer?
Finding the time to create! Before Alden was born, I thought that since I wouldn’t be “working” for a while when he was tiny, I would have nothing but time to sit and draw and sew. Thinking back, I probably could have fit in more in those super early days than I can now, but I could not pry my eyes from that tiny little guy for a second! Babies are really compelling creatures.
Lately I’ve also felt that the creative slumps I’ve been experiencing are probably due to having such a fixed schedule. We’ve taken a couple of very brief trips this summer and the change I felt in my veins, just from getting out of our routine was amazing. I wish I could bottle that feeling. Coffee provides a somewhat close, if short-lived approximation, but there is nothing like being out of your element (and I don’t even mean in a high adventure sort of way) to clear your head of the crowding mess.
What is your favorite thing(s) out of everything you have made?
The first thing that I thought of was a vest from the Tidal Detritus collection. It was sort of strange and not something I would necessarily wear, but I just really liked it as an object. I worked on it for a while and felt it was more substantial than just a piece of clothing, if that makes any sense. Like, it had soul in a way that I don’t think most of the things I make do. I never thought it would sell, but one of my favorite customers bought it and gave it to her grandma (or grandma-in-law, maybe) and that just made me so happy.
What is your dream as a designer?
In my daydreams, I work in a light-filled studio, with open windows. There is a salty breeze blowing in, rustling some light garments on a nearby rack. The wooden hangers clack together gently as I move slowly about over worn-thin kilim rugs on wide-planked floorboards, in bare feet, cutting and pinning and sewing and singing for hours. Maybe I have a little stove to make coffee on, too. There is no computer and the walls are almost bare, white–no distractions, no noise, no chatter. Just me and all of the tools that I need. Oh, and nothing ever breaks.
What I want from the designing/making process is really just the process of it. The order and the movement and the satisfaction of completing a project. If other people like what I’ve made, that is so rad and gives me a wonderfully warm feeling. I have learned though, that if I try to create for that end alone, I don’t enjoy the work as much because it’s too anxious. It’s still a struggle to break free from that need for validation for my work, but part of my dream, a big part, is being able to separate good self-critiquing from vague chatter and assumptions about what’s good.
Tags: artist interview, creative process, Dear Birthday, indie designer, Lovelier Seas, maker, Valerie Soles
Awesome interview!!!