I was lucky enough to be in attendance at the first day of the first annual Growing a Creative Economy conference, hosted by the Cape Breton Centre for Craft and Design, earlier this week. The first day had several excellent speakers, and I came away with an actionable list of things I can do to help my customers really see my jewellery, and be able to visualize any one of them working within their existing wardrobe. I was given a completely free consultation on my displays (we actually dragged her right to the store!) and I’m already working on adjusting them. I got info on trends and innovation and collaboration and using the media and I’m tingling with ideas! It pushed me into the website update I just completed, and a new way to use existing materials appeared fully realized in my head right in the middle of a talk!
In addition to the actual content of the talks, I also found myself surrounded by creative types… every one of them tingling too… and it was like the vibration in the room churned up my imagination so that I’m brimming with ideas.
I wasn’t able to attend the final two days (oh day job, you pay the bills but why are you so mean?) and I regret it fully – friends have called it life-changing. But just that one day has sparked me enormously and made me feel lucky to live in this inspiring art community. I’m grateful to CBCCD and the folks who came to the conference; and you can bet that I’ll be doing the WHOLE conference next year!
Finally, I am hoping to pull together a group of creative folks to meet, say, once a month, to bounce ideas off each other in a pub. Interested?
YES!!!! I could say more, but we will wait til that pub meeting. When and where shall we have this meeting of the creative minds?
Don’t know! Crown and moose? Governor’s? The third tuesday of every month? Every second Saturday? Whatever works :)
Save me a seat!
You betcha!
I made us a Facebook group! http://www.facebook.com/groups/290378531093024/