It wasn’t hard to find the Musterbrand booth at Star Wars Celebration this year… all you had to do was follow the sound of excitement and backtrack those walking away with some fabulous jackets in hand. Every time I walked by their booth, they were quite busy with plenty of fans, both men and women, interested in their line of high quality jackets and sweaters and for good reason. They make a damn good product. One of my con roommates even happily walked away with their incredible TIE pilot inspired leather jacket.
I’d previously purchased their Cassian Andor jacket and honestly haven’t been able to shut up about how much I love it to people both online and in real life. Frankly, it was fantastic to see how many people were not only interested in Musterbrand’s line but also happy to spend the money for quality work. It also helps that I cannot say enough good things about the people working the Musterbrand booth all weekend as they were all incredibly nice and helpful and made the booth a lovely place to visit. If you ever have a chance to stop by their booth at a convention, I absolutely recommend doing so.
While they were only on display on Thursday, Musterbrand’s newest offerings were the talk of certain circles at the convention. In the very near future, they’ll be officially debuting their first line of shoes with some fantastic Star Wars inspired designs. [Editor’s Note: The Skywalker and Darth Vader sneakers have been put online for preorder.] The designs range from the slightly more obvious to the more subtly nerdy inspired. My personal favorites are the Leia inspired flat and the Rebel pilot sneaker as they’re not quite like anything we’ve seen on the market thus far. Having gotten my hands on the shoes, I can personally attest to the quality. Musterbrand has put the same amount of thought and care into their shoes that they’ve put into their jackets which makes for a winning combination. (Stay tuned for a closer look at the sneakers in the coming weeks…)
During the convention, Musterbrand’s founder and CEO Knut Bergel was kind enough to chat with me about Musterbrand’s start, the design process, and what we might see in the future. The transcript of our conversation is below: (more…)
It’s our second interview from Awesome Con last month! In June, I had the chance to chat with the awesome Elena from The Colorful Geek who just happened to have the booth next to Jordandené. We talked fandom, geek fashion, and a lot of Percy Jackson!
How did you get involved fandom?
Quite a few years ago, Harry Potter was like my [fandom] drug. For some reason, I had resisted reading it for years and years and then I went on vacation with my friend who was on business and I was at the hotel’s pool every day. I bought the Harry Potter books and I read them there and it was over after that. I was immediately addicted and read the entire series. I think it was 2003? I read the entire series as quickly as possible and then the next one came out. Right before the last book came out, someone told me what a podcast was and I just started listening to all the Harry Potter podcasts and it was like crack. They started talking about a Harry Potter convention up in Canada: Prophecy. I went by myself, got a room full of people, and that was pretty much the start of my fandom was there.
It was that convention that kind of started all of this stuff because back then, you couldn’t find a shirt like mine or like Jordan’s. I looked and I found some really ugly ones so I went to Target and bought some cheap tank tops and went to a craft shop and bought letter-shaped sponges and I just stamped Harry Potter stuff on them. (more…)
At Awesome Con a mere week ago, I was lucky enough to get the chance to chat with Jordan of Jordandené. Not only is she the maker of the ‘Kylo Ren is a Punk Bitch’ shirt (and so much more,) but she’s also a super awesome lady. We talked about fandom, how she got started designing, what goes in to making a shirt, and tons more!
How did you get involved in fandom?
The very beginning… I was super into Pokémon in third or fourth grade. That was the first all-in-fandom thing I did and then I phased it out in middle school, high school, and college. I read Harry Potter senior year of college and that was it. I joined a Harry Potter fan club, I went to my first con, and then I went to a thousand more cons and just got into all of it.
Well my next question was going to be “What are your biggest fandoms?” but I’m guessing Harry Potter?
Harry Potter 100%! Harry Potter is the top by far. Doctor Who… I like hanging out in the fandom but I’m never caught up on the show and I’ve never seen any of the classics. I just like hanging out. My favorite right now is Marvel because it’s just fun. Same thing though: I’ve only read two comics. I’ve seen the movies and I watch the shows but it doesn’t go deep. Harry Potter is the only one I know about.
When did you first get into designing everything you do for the shop?
Five years ago, I graduated college, I was a nanny part time, and I just wanted something fun to do on the side so I opened an Etsy shop, not expecting it to go anywhere. It was just a hobby and then it just grew from there. Which is amazing!
So what goes into making an item? Do you start with ‘I want to make a new Harry Potter shirt!’ and then go from there?
Recently, I’ve been getting so much feedback and so many requests from people that that’s been the start. Someone will ask for a Supernatural shirt or the Star Wars trailer will come out and people will go “Do this now!” So sometimes it’s a request and sometimes I’m just watching something and go “This is great.” It’s usually the idea first and then it’s narrowing down what the quote’s going to be, how long it has to be to fit, and what sounds cool. My husband actually does all of the hand lettering and ink and brushes it. I scan it in and get the design and choose the colors and print the shirt.
So you guys print them yourselves?
Yeah! I print them all myself right now. I just moved and now I have a little screen-printing studio in the basement of my apartment.
How do you even get into printing shirts?
I started sewing the aprons. That was the first thing; I had a sewing machine and fabric and that was it and then started a few other things. A friend of mine who knows how to screen print was like “You’re crazy. You can’t hand sew a business forever. Let me help you and teach you.” Thankfully, one of my best friends did it in college and knows how. Over a year and a half, she did the printing and I slowly picked it up.
How many people are involved in Jordandené?
Right now, it’s basically me and then there are people I work with on different aspects. My husband does the design, my friend is my screen-printing consultant, and I have another friend who helps sew. There are people doing different things—it’s not like I’m a team of one because I know how to do everything but at the end of the day, all the emails and photos and site stuff is me.
How do you find enough hours in the day to handle it all? You’re very active on social media.
Totally!
We were chatting on Instagram two days ago.
This is just what I do! The fun thing about social media is that I have friends there so I have fun doing it so it’s not just like I’m doing this from 9-5 and then forgetting about it for the rest of the day. I just live it. That’s how it works right now.
I found out about you guys via Facebook—I think one of my friends posted the Kylo Ren shirt—
Oh nice!
So would you say that social media is something that’s helped you grow the company?
Totally! My whole business is online except for 10 cons a year. Without social networks… honestly the reason that conventions work is because I meet people online and then they come hang out with me in person. [There was some laughing here since that’s exactly what I did!] If I didn’t have that, I wouldn’t have business.
Switching gears a little bit: how do you decide between making a design part of your regular line or having it be a shirt of the month?
It’s either something that I’m not sure will sell well or… I use the shirt of the month as an experiment. If it goes well, I can say “Oh this is a fandom people love!” or “This was a good idea. Maybe I should bring it back someday.” Or when there’s something that I just want to do and I have no idea if other people will like them or not. I did a Kurt Vonnegut quote last week and that’s not a sustainable new product but I just wanted to and I wanted one. Shirt of the month is mostly for designs where it’s more questionable how it’s going to sell.
Has the Kylo Ren is a Punk Bitch shirt made its way into the normal line up yet?
That wasn’t even a shirt of the month. That was a birthday present to myself as a joke. I really thought I would sell zero. I was like, “No one has seen this skit. No one will care about this.” It became my most popular item in two and a half weeks. It outsold the thing I’d sold the most of over the last two years in a few weeks. If you Google me, that shirt comes up first. It’s hilarious.
Any design teases that you might want to give us?
Actually, I have six new designs here at Awesome Con that aren’t online yet and no one knows about. Honestly, the teasers are just things that came out in the last two weeks because I wanted them. July’s shirt is a super experiment. It is a song lyric, which I haven’t done yet. It’s a little bit of tribute and a little bit related to my personal life. It’s a song lyric from a song that was in my wedding ceremony but is also very current and a tribute to an artist so you’ll know right away…
Ohhh!
Yes, so that’s coming up in July because it’s my anniversary and it’s going to be fun, summer colors.
Pretty sure there’s a certain comic book writer I’m going to have to link this to because he’s a huge fan.
Awesome!
Okay so my last question for you is: what is your dream goal for Jordandené?
My super dream goal is to have a store. I don’t want it to be a me store; I want it to be a Fangirl Haven store. That’s a super down the line dream goal. My dream goal until three months ago was to have a studio and then I got one. It would be really fun to have a full team mostly because I think it would be really cool to hang out with the kind of people who would be my team. If I can grow to the point where I have a little social media help and a little customer service help and a little manufacturing help, that would be great. The goal is just to do this long enough to meet a lot of cool people. Next year, I’m going to try and do more shows. It’s going to be my year of cons. I’m excited about that! I want to go to the west coast and meet all my internet friends there. So yeah, that’s really the goal!
Thank you again to Jordan for chatting with me! You can find her online at her store, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or maybe soon at a convention near you!
There’s little I love more than a cute hair accessory so when I discovered Little Asian Sweatshop, I was super excited! I can’t recall whether I first saw her table at a convention or if I saw her on Etsy but either way, I was definitely hell bent on getting one of her hair flowers. Last weekend at Baltimore Comic Con, I was able to sit down with Fennie, the lovely lady behind Little Asian Sweatshop, and chat with her about her shop, geeky things, and the joys of conventions. It was such a fantastically enjoyable time that we just kept chatting and I’ve had to edit this interview a little bit for length.
Bria (WHR): How did you get involved with fandom?
Fennie (Little Asian Sweatshop): I’ve always been a baby geek since my early days. The way I got into fandom was actually at the first and only sleepover my mother ever let me go to when I was a kid. I’m Chinese so growing up, you’re not allowed to go to sleepovers. You’re at home, you do violin, you practice your math. I mean, not to do the stereotypes but my life was a stereotype. My best friend at the time in the 7th grade was this girl who was also Chinese, our parents knew each other, and for her birthday, she wanted a sleepover. This was such a big deal in my circle of friends because we’re all Chinese and we’ve never been to a sleepover together even though we’ve always heard about it. We go to the sleepover and there was this big drama—our parents kept calling each other every 5 minutes to make sure we weren’t doing anything bad. The fact that we had a second cupcake set off a parent conference.
So we’re just sitting there and we’re playing the dumbest slumber party games. Her big brother was a comic book fan and he had around one of the X-men graphic novels. It was the collection of the first run with Xavier and Jean Grey. I was so bored by these games because this was not the slumber party that they showed on TV and this was not cool. So I’m sitting there in the corner reading this comic book and I’m like… “I don’t know what this is but this is my life. This is amazing. There’s a whole world that doesn’t involve math, violin, studying, or Chinese school!” From there, I started talking to the brother and he told me that they sell comic books at 7-11 and I had to walk by a 7-11 to get home from school every day so I would illicitly buy comic books. And that’s how I got into the dark, deep underbelly of comic books.
So your mother not letting you go to sleepovers turned out well.
Exactly!
You found comics. How did you get into accessory making?
Actually, my best friend and I used to cosplay all the time so I was really good at sewing. I could make the outfits but I was really bad about accessorizing and making the little pieces and she used to make all of them. The accessories really make a costume. It’s the make up, the hair, the everything. From there, I became kind of obsessed and it all became (gestures at table) this.
And then you decided to open your shop?
What happened was that I started off my shop making cosplay stuff like skirts and dresses and hairbands and so forth. My best friend was getting married in Vegas and I had this crazy— I don’t even know what I was on… too much caffeine and on life or something. She was getting married in Vegas and I had this crazy idea that I was going to make a dress out of poker cards for the wedding. I can even hear her cringe now. I was convinced that this was what I was going to do so I bought all of these poker cards. By the way, if you’ve never sewn cards, just don’t do it. It will end in tears and rage. So I was all pissed off and I came back two days later and I open the door to my work room and all of the cuttings looked like flower petals on the floor. I thought that I had to be able to do something with this and that’s what ended up starting all of my hair accessories which then became my most popular item because no one else makes them. It was completely unique and completely different. (more…)
Finding fun geek jewelry at an affordable price sometimes feels like the search for the Holy Grail especially when you’re looking for something a little more unique than a Batman necklace. I was super psyched to discover Meredith Funk’s Etsy shop FoxyFunk last fall when someone on Twitter shared her Rebel Starbird necklace. Ever since then, I’ve been a huge fan of her store and it’s the first place I check when I want a new geeky necklace. In fact, you’ve probably seen her work as an accessory in one of my Star Wars outfit of the day posts over the last month.
That’s why I’m really excited that she was willing to stop by and chat a little about her store, her process, and geeky things in general!
Bria (White Hot Room): Hi Meredith! Welcome and thanks so much for agreeing to chat with me today! To start us off, how did you first get involved in fandom?
Meredith (FoxyFunk): I had always been a bit of a “nerd”. In high school nerds weren’t quite as cool as they are now. I even arranged my schedule so I could play video games in the middle of my school day. A few years out of high school, I moved to Denver where I met some really amazing wonderful people that introduced me to Conventions! I had finally found what I never knew I was looking for – unconditional acceptance. Ever since then, my inner nerd has flourished and has no signs of stopping!
WHR: When did you first get into crafting/jewelry making?
Meredith: Long ago in my rambunctious youth, I would be dropped off at the mall and left there for hours with my best friend. We would combine our measly chore earnings and join financial powers to buy amazing jewelry making kits at the toy store. At least, we thought they were amazing… It had always just been something I was capable of doing, I had no idea that it would become anything more. (more…)