This past weekend I participated in the Art Star Craft Bazaar in Philadelphia with my good friend, Eleanor Kennell (EleanorJaneJewelry.com). This was my first craft show and my first show since I graduated last May, and I was so excited to be a part of such a great event!

The show was up both Saturday and Sunday from 11am-6pm and we had beautiful weather, sunny with a light breeze and temperatures in the mid 70’s. It also didn’t hurt that we had an excellent booth location just inside the Walnut Street entrance overlooking the water.

It was really exciting to see the crowds lined up at the gate before the event opened. The first 250 people that entered the show received a free tote bag containing promotional materials and brochures for fellow vendors. My first sale came within a few moment of opening, a robin’s egg blue cell necklace as a sweet sixteen gift, what a great feeling! We also had lots of people specifically looking for our booth after having seen our work on the vendor list for Art Star, an excellent advertisement. I was also glad to hear how many people had seen our work at the Art Unleashed event which was held at the end of April at the University of the Arts featuring student, faculty and alumni work. The entire Art Star show was organized beautifully and made for a particularly smooth weekend, we couldn’t ask for more! It was fun to see friends and classmates and hear what they had to say about our work and booth set up.

Overall, it was a wonderful experience and I learned a lot! There are a few things I definitely need to work on, including putting up an etsy site and finding an efficient (and hopefully inexpensive) way to accept credit cards at future shows. Also, blogging regularly to update my customers and maintain an archive of my experiences at each event and throughout the preparation process. I was also very thankful to have Katie of Moonlight Bindery as a booth neighbor. She was a wealth of information, not to mention an incredible artist!! I had to have one of her cork covered journals and luckily she was willing to trade for a pair of bitter green enameled dangling post earrings.