When I first started Lawson in 2017, I was living in New Orleans, a very art centric city. My initial idea for selling my woodwork was small furniture and picture frames with the focus being on custom framing with local artists. Boy, was I wrong on both counts. But you have to start somewhere, right? And that leads me to the point of this blog post - adaptation and evolution.
Because I was a complete novice to the world of art markets, I never considered what a bitch it would be to transport small furniture to and from locations. Plus, I had no inclination that was exactly what buyers were thinking also which is why I often returned home with the furniture. And I didn’t fair too well with the frames I was creating. Either it was the sizes I had (or didn’t have) or it was the design/color choices I had available. Plus, the frames were not as easy to display as I thought they would be. After a few first market attempts I knew something had to change.
About a year into Lawson, I made a custom ash box for a client which became one of those game changing events. I switched gears and began making memory boxes for art markets. Like my furniture and frames, the boxes were 100% handcrafted with original, hand-painted designs. They were also easier to transport and display. I immediately nixed the furniture and over time the frames. The memory boxes led to utensil holders and valet trays, which led to larger serving trays.
The number of items I was creating and taking to the markets eventually required a set-up of four 4-foot tables, a 6-foot table, tablecloths, display furniture and accessories, signage, bins to transport products and materials, as well as a 10X10-foot tent to house it all. My downsizing from furniture to memory boxes eventually led to an upsizing of everything else, including product.
I live and do art markets predominantly in the Gulf South. Weather is constantly changing here from moment to moment. I have 3 weather apps on my phone. Living and working so close to the Gulf of Mexico you have to prepared for those random, no warning storms even if your 3 weather apps say differently. I can deal with taking home more product with me from an art market than I would like, but taking home wet product, a wet tent, wet tables and tablecloths, wet signage, wet - you get the point - was a little more than I wanted to deal with. After more than one rained out market and having to deal with all my items soaked, including the interior of my car, I knew it was again time to start figuring out something new.
At first I adopted the simple idea of “less is more”. I began by taking less product with me to art markets, specifically more expensive and bigger items like serving trays (keeping them as online “exclusives”). Then I started removing display furniture here and there to restrict the amount of product I could take to markets. By this point though a little disaster called Covid-19 came along and brought the world to a screeching halt.
Not one to sit still for long I used the time of the Great Shutdown of 2020 as an opportunity to revamp some ideas for Lawson. I used plenty of scrap MDF to create new display pieces as well as clean up some existing ones. I also decided to tackle an idea I had been playing with in my mind for several years - ornaments.
Around 1968/69 my father (one of two main inspirations for my own work - his dad, my grandfather being the other and the namesake of Lawson Woodworks) made a set of wooden Christmas ornaments. The set was one of those prefabricated kits that comprised of predesigned ornaments you punched out of balsa wood sheets, assembled, and then painted. Every couple of years my dad would touch up the paint and eventually added glitter to them in the 80s. The ornaments are still a cherished family item and are the first ornaments to go on the Christmas tree every year. I had been wanting to replicate them for years and decided with the shutdown it was the perfect time.
I made my first set of Christmas ornaments which some were directly inspired by my father’s, and some were completely original designs. As the world slowly reopened and art markets trickled back to showing I began to display and sell them. Then for a thematic market I created a line of mermaid and sea life ornaments. Like the Christmas ornaments these ornaments were both 3D and 2D. My process for all these ornaments was slightly labor intensive and the selling price was slightly higher than what most people wanted to pay, but the overall response was positive. I was on to something, but I needed to figure out a simpler approach to bring down the cost.
After simplifying the process and slightly expanding the ornaments into a few categories beyond Christmas like a cocktail line, a horror icon line (really for me), and wildlife line I debuted them at my first show in September of 2022 (pictured above). They were a hit. As the year progressed, I added more categories to the ornaments and began to sell more of them than any other product I had to offer. Over the course of 2022 I began to revamp my tent set up excluding more tables and therefore memory boxes, utensil holders, and trays to make room for the abundance of ornaments I was making and more importantly, selling.
This revision of my tent display and what I was predominantly selling became so obvious with every set up and break down at each market. I had more room in my car and the time to do both was greatly reduced. Plus, I was finally going home with less than what I took to the markets.
As of now I am covering two walls with ornaments with one wall dedicated to 2 4-foot tables displaying a few memory boxes and other items. My current goal is to expand to 2.5 walls of ornaments with one table dedicated to my other items. To show my work available online I created a catalog for guests to flip through - also a great way to show off my custom work which allows guests to know they can order that too!
So going into my 6th year of starting Lawson Woodworks I am figuring out my place in the art market world. It takes time. Being open to changing my thought process was definitely instrumental in getting to where I am now. Also, I am completely aware that more change is to come, and I am excited to see what that will be.