Clare Spelta

Bon Maxie

Clare started Bon Maxie in 2015. After having a baby boy, Max, she realised she’d lost her creative outlet. During eight years in corporate advertising and marketing. So started a business painting portraits and selling nursery art prints.

But things changed. A few months in, Clare was back at work, and their beautiful new baby started having seizures and horrible brain spasms. She quit her job to care for him, and he was diagnosed with a rare genetic mutation. They spent most of 2016 in and out of the hospital.

Time became precious. Clare knew she didn’t have as much time to spend painting detailed portraits. So sought to create a product that could duplicate to work more efficiently while caring for Max.

But she was stressed now. And it was because of earring mess. So, she created herself an earring holder. Realising there wasn’t anything like this on the market, she shared her creation on Instagram. The response was overwhelming, and Bon Maxie quickly became synonymous with earring organisation.

Now? They have a super-fun range of non-ugly earring holders and accessory storage. As well as their signature products the Mighty Mini Wallet and Sidekick Crossbody Bag.

And Max? He’s now seizure-free, walking against the odds with promising signs of communication. He was the reason why Clare started the business, and now, he’s the reason they work so hard in it.

BY Podcast Covers Issue 2_Clare

Clare’s Podcast: Making messy, less stressy

  • How Bon Maxie came about and her plans for the future
  • Advice for those who have an idea they want to manufacture
  • E-commerce: the good, the bad and the ugly
  • Hint and tips for building a loyal following

Transcript

Rowena 0:05
One of the very first things that attracted me to you was the name. I’d never heard anything like it before. So can you tell us a little bit about the reasoning behind the name Bon Maxie?

Clare 0:15
Yeah, the name came about originally, my brand was all about nursery prints and nursery artwork. And it started because I was at home with my son MaX. And I thought about Max and Me Prints and Max and Me this and I thought it was a little bit too restrictive, if I decided to expand, so we call him Maxie, and it sounded a bit French, so I threw a Bon in front of it and Bon Maxie is where it’s at.

Rowena 0:41
So how did your business come about? You’ve already mentioned that you were doing artworks and you were at home with your son, can you tell us a little bit about your story about how you came to have Bon Maxie

Clare 0:50
Back in 2015 I’d had a baby. I’d been working pretty heavily in consultancy as a marketer and I’d done advertising before that. So pretty intense environments. And I hadn’t really done many creative things for a while. And I have a history of painting artists really, and I hadn’t painted in so long. So when I suddenly found myself with a lot of time, while Max is sleeping, I felt quite lost and I started painting again. And then I also tried to look for a mother’s group or some kind of community online because Facebook groups weren’t really a thing back then. And I hopped onto Instagram. And I realised that there was this whole community of small businesses doing amazing things. And I thought, well, well if they can do it, I could probably start trying to sell something to you know, I’ve got a marketing background, I can do this. And I started a website and I threw some prints up online and made first sale 12 weeks after that, which was insane. It started from there. And then I’d always done custom portraits, little kids and family kind of like a cartoony style. And so I started doing that as well. And that was the beginning of Bon Maxie.

Rowena 1:57
And obviously it’s taken a big segway from that point as well, hasn’t it?

Clare 2:02
It has.

Rowena 2:03
You manufacture bags and wallets that you’ve designed yourself as well as jewellery holders as well. Where did that leap happen?

Clare 2:11
I think it was probably a good eight or nine months after I started the business. Like my books were full with custom portraits, my son was getting a bit more active and I was really starting to panic that I wasn’t going to be able to sustain and how I thought it would be easy back then. I wasn’t going to be able to sustain what I was doing. So I thought if I can make something that takes a little less time, like each portrait was taking me two or three hours, if I can make something that that I can bulk create that helps people so isn’t just a luxury item, which a portrait really is then that might be a better option to introduce a product like that into our stores. Yeah, one day, I was just rummaging through my five or six jewellery dishes on my dresser and I was panicking because I couldn’t find a matching earring. And my husband was ready to get out the door. And we were both frustrated and I just thought Oh, hang on, wouldn’t it be good if I could see everything that I have all at one glance, there’s probably a better way. So it took a little bit of research and I found that there was a lot of chicken wire earring holders and a lot of clear plastic. And I thought well, I mean, I like colour. I’ve got, you know, an arty background. And I feel like this could probably be a bit nicer. So I made quite an intricate design on a piece of woods that I hand cut and hand drilled and I’ve popped that on Instagram and the response was crazy. I suddenly realised there were all these tiny networks of earring makers in Australia that popped out of the woodwork and I thought okay, yep, yeah, I think I’m onto something here. So it grew from there. Eventually I dropped the portraits and the nursery artwork because I felt like I was getting out of that baby zone. My son fell ill when he was nine months old, and I didn’t want to be thinking about baby stuff because I was in a bit of a bad space at that point. So I took it as a sign that I needed to pivot, the word of 2020, back then pivoted and thought no I need to really give this jewellery holder thing crack. I was getting more demands for bigger sizes, hanging versions, different colours, started getting stockists asking for products it started to grow into something quite different to what I thought it would be. And I tried to categorise it as print artwork, prints and accessory holders and that really didn’t make sense at all. So I needed to review what my whole business was about and the theme that just kept coming up with I’m helping mess become less stressy. And I think that’s really where the handbags and the wallet have come from that my problems have turned into products that help solve those problems. And I’ve just kept my fingers crossed this entire time that other people have the same problems that I do. So it’s worked out quite nicely. I think we’re a little bit disorganised. So that’s that’s kind of the evolution of where we are.

Rowena 4:46
I don’t spend a lot of money on my jewellery, but it’s so I can have a lot of it.

Clare 4:50
Yeah.

Rowena 4:52
I’ve always struggled to find stuff like that, like it’s never quite considered, especially those chicken wire ones. Jesus. I swear like they got more tangled than the actual jewellery was in the first place. So now you are running an ecom business, I have seen how fast things fly off your shelves. I mean admittedly, let’s be honest, 2020 has been a bit of a bitch for sourcingO.

Clare 5:18
Oh yes it has.

Rowena 5:19
But in a lot of ways, like I saw how fast you just sold out of your most recent new release that you’ve done. And by the time I clicked, the one that I was after it was gone.

Clare 5:29
Yeah, I was quite as, just as surprised as you.

Rowena 5:32
But I’m not surprised in that it’s a gorgeous product that you make like you can see it is quality.

Clare 5:38
Thank you.

Rowena 5:38
You mentioned earlier that a big part of what you do you quite happily go down research and design exploration vortexes where you dig in deep. How does that process work for you? And what are some of the discoveries you’ve made? Like, I know that research can be a big deal for a lot of businesses, they don’t know where to start.

Clare 5:56
Research is a huge factor. And I think so many people just say, Oh, that’s a good idea. And then they just start a business and run with that when there’s really not a gap. And there’s not a distinction between what they’re selling and what the next door neighbour, you know, store is selling to. I think really drilling down into that age old marketing questions “what problem are we solving?”. And I think that’s really where I feel like I’ve excelled at in my own headspace because I really get angry about things that probably shouldn’t be getting angry about. But I think Well, there’s a problem here. What can I do to solve it? And I think now I look for problems in my day to day life, because I’m looking for next product ideas. So I think that’s kind of, you know, taking a full 360 that problems present themselves. Whereas before, you know, when you’re looking for a problem to create a product. So yeah, I think in terms of development, you just start looking around you and working out what gaps you can fill, who you’re marketing to, you know, price points, materials, all of that. And it’s a real process that I think people don’t realise how big it is that having notepads everywhere helps having Google at your fingertips help and also having access to a gazillion other, you know, Instagram businesses that you hop on any homework and you see what people are doing that really helps to get an idea of what you should be, could be, shouldn’t be doing yet somewhat easier, I think to start a business than it ever has been.

Rowena 7:14
I felt so seen when recently, you’ve ran people through all the different perks of your bags. You know, I feel like going out handbag shopping is like shopping for a pair of jeans. Finding exactly what you’re after, can be so hard every time you went through something I was like, “Yes, that’s what I look for”, especially the light lining. I’m terrible for just chucking things my bag and I swear to God, they become a black hole. But if I can actually see what’s in there, then it doesn’t happens so much. Clearly, you have an amazing marketing background because you’ve marketed your products beautifully. From a branding designer’s point of view, the branding is completely and utterly on point for you. It felt like I knew you before I jumped on this conversation because it is so true to who you are.

Clare 7:58
I’m glad. I’m glad that’s coming across.

Rowena 8:02
A lot of what always has confronted me about, you know, ecommerce, and especially manufacturing a product. It’s a lot. For anyone that’s thinking about heading down this path, what sorts of guidance do you have? And what sorts of things have you learned along the way that have been invaluable?

Clare 8:19
I like to think I’m different. But I’m really not that different from other people in the sense that I’ve been a handmade product that we’ve scaled. And if I had to do it again, I probably wouldn’t do it that way mainly because you know everything like I mentioned before, every every earring holder I used to be hand cut, we have this house full of sawdust and then we used to hand drill every single hole and we notched up about a million holes that we drilled by hand before we thought, oh a machine could probably do a better job than we could. So we’ve been through the process of how things start. I knew the hole size that I needed. I knew the finishes on the wood that I needed. I knew that I needed to find a better way instead of hand painting, we eventually got designs printed onto the wood. All of that came from problems that we had come up against and trying to find a solution within that problem. I think in terms of trying to find how to do that it depends what kind of business you want. If you want to be the artist who hand makes everything be that person. I knew my limitation. And at some point when orders were coming in, and I had to scramble to get products made and then we were staying up till one o’clock at night packing because I’ve been painting the whole day. You know, that was a problem that we needed to solve. So manufacturing turned into the solution. But to start with manufacturing, I mean Google is your best friend, really there is somebody out there doing everything, anything that you can think of. So it’s just a matter of sorting through what it is that you really want working out the problems that you’ll come up against and that will inevitably without a doubt be problems you never even imagined were possible. Even if you plan everything to a tee like I do. And I also go through a list of the worst case scenarios and I still can’t spot where things are going to go wrong. So just working through that and knowing that you have to do that is your best friend really because you just have to push through, if you’ve got an idea and you want to get it done, you just have to push through and use whatever resource you can find

Rowena 10:06
Problems in a lot of ways are actually your best friend. It sucks when you’re in the moment, like we’ve all been there, we’ve all gone, oh crap, whether it’s you know, a client or whether it’s a product, it’s still all the same, there’s still those things, but taking a really proactive look at those types of things can actually change the direction of your business. And it can actually make it better. Asking yourself that question, how can I avoid this happening again.

Clare 10:30
Sometimes being negative when you’re starting out with something and focusing on the negatives, and most people would say that’s a really bad attitude to take. But I think it’s damage control. When something does happen, you’re not completely thrown off the handle with you know, what you have to do, you’ve actually had a bit of a think about it, that if this does go wrong, I think I have an idea that this is the steps that I need to take to solve it.

Rowena 10:51
Yeah. And it can be really hard, especially when you’re in that space by yourself to get into like a bit of a spiral headspace. I feel like even just recognising the thought patterns can make such a difference to how fast things can be solved as well.

Clare 11:05
Yeah, absolutely. I think I was listening to Brene Brown podcast the other day and she said her way of dealing with you know, whether or not she gets upset or stressed is, does she know all of the fact then? Yes. And then does it warrant freaking out nine times out of 10 no, and then if she doesn’t know all of the facts, then you really can’t justify freaking out. Yeah, emotions come into play a lot in business, you need to pick your battles with yourself too. Be kinder to realise that you just have to do and some things will definitely go wrong.

Rowena 11:32
It’s no longer just you, you have a team now.

Clare 11:35
Yeah, we do have a team, I was very purposeful in how we set up our team. I had worked on or in an online only business prior to this. And that was a very pro-mother environment. And I was very conscious of ensuring that people don’t feel the need to have to go to an office to do work, especially if they’ve got small children at home. And again, with our son, we have to drop everything sometimes and run and having an office full of people wasn’t an option for us. So we decided to kind of construct the business around that. So we’ve got our graphic designer that’s a whiz, we’ve got our admin and customer service guru, also a whiz. And then we’ve got an external warehouse that packs our orders, you know, that’s our team. We talk to them every day. But they’re all essentially small businesses in themselves. So we’ve got contractors that work with us. And I’ve also got somebody who helps me with content and The Digital Picnic is another crew that has been really fabulous in letting me let go of some of the stuff that I just don’t want to do anymore. Because it takes up too much headspace. We’ve got a great team, it’s working so well, I probably wouldn’t change we’re setup at all.

Rowena 12:40
So in a lot of ways, you were almost prepared for 2020 and all that at held and that you are pretty much working remotely already. For other people that are considering doing that and starting to either look at contractors, it’s a really scary space to be in, you know, as much as it can be full on when it’s all just on you the thought of the responsibility of someone else. How do you find the people that will were right for you?

Clare 13:02
It took a long time, I don’t trust very easily. And I’ve also been burnt before with contractors that I have trusted and trusted my brand with and it’s just not been the right fit. Hire slowly and fire quickly.That’s easier said than done. But you know, you start to get gut feelings about things, and you just need to act on it. But I think having contractors, that’s an easy way to kind of cut ties if it’s not working. And that might be an easy way to test somebody out, use them for a little bit and then work out whether it works and then move on if it doesn’t. I asked around a lot like our admin/customer service, she’s worked with plenty of other businesses that I know. And I was able to talk to her directly and talk to other people who’ve worked with her to see whether we have a similar style. And with the graphic design, we just happen to be next to each other in a market and we started chatting and she offered us services. And I thought, I’m not sure if you’re the right fit. But then we got to know each other a bit better. And, you know, I think it’s just getting to know people because work, the outcome of work. And then the actual working style and the person that they are two very separate things. Somebody can be a really efficient worker and produce great things. But if you don’t get along with them as people, that’s a big red flag,

Rowena 14:12
You’re ultimately choosing for them to be a part of your family. Because this is, you know, it’s really important to you it is a huge part of your life. So you’re asking someone to come in and have your trust, you have to be able to communicate, you have to have be able to have those tough conversations, but you also need to be able to bitch and whinge where needs be.

Clare 14:30
Yeah, that’s it. I have a bit of a vent.

Rowena 14:33
You have a marketing background and I know that you do outsource some of you marketing now as well. When it was just you like you’ve got a huge following on Instagram like it’s really impressive. I’ve seen the growth that you’ve gone through. It has grown in leaps and bounds and a lot of that can come down to the fact that you’re constantly looking for the next thing, you’re constantly looking at improving on yourself as well. What do you put down as that thing that is key to building a loyal following on Instagram or social media in general?

Clare 15:03
It really comes down to putting your face out there, I know that’s the worst piece of advice that a lot of people would want to hear because they just want to hide behind a brand and not have a face attached to it. But I started off with just me and I think at this point, because I am the one person who can explain my product, the way that they need to be explained, I think it makes sense that I’m the one to do it. So I think especially with social media, we’ve been pushed towards video content, very unsubtly. And I think it’s just, I mean, the name stories on Instagram makes you think that perhaps people like watching stories and getting to know brands and the reasons behind it and behind the scenes. And without a doubt, that’s the type of content that I know my followers resonate with, because they get to know me, and we have personal chats. So you know, I have really in depth conversations with people I’ve never met before. I think that’s been a huge part of both the business success and also the numbers on social media. Your vibe attracts your tribe, whatever that saying is, because at the end of the day, you can’t fake being yourself. It shows when you’re inauthentic on social media, it really and people are so cluey now and they’re quite savvy when you’re being sold something other side of the coin when somebody is genuinely sharing something that they really think is valuable. So I think that’s been a huge, a huge reason why I feel like I’ve got a really amazing, loyal customer base. Because I’ve been there, you know, from the start, and they’ve really grown with me, and we have conversations daily.

Rowena 16:28
Those conversations that you have with people. it comes all the way back full circle to research, you’ve got this amazing platform full of people that have already actively consumed what you’re offering.

Clare 16:39
And their still there.

Rowena 16:40
Precisely. And they want to know what that next thing is. And so which actually brings me to a perfect segway to the next question, what is the next thing for Bon Maxie? What do you plan for the future?

Clare 16:49
I’d like to say I’ve got a five year plan kind of mapped out. But I’ve learnt even you know, looking back to last year, I have no idea that I mean, we none of us knew that 2020 was going to look the way that it does currently. So I think that’s a bit of an example how you just can’t predict what things are going to be like. So I’ve got a very rough idea of somethings that I wouldn’t mind doing. And of course, you know, I wouldn’t be a smart business unless I had, you know, particular financial goals, you know, in different goals like that, that I wouldn’t mind reaching. But I really, I dislike planning too far in advance now. I try and focus on the three to six month mark, because things change and we get thrown curveballs and I don’t want to be so set in my ways that I can’t change to suit that

Rowena 17:32
Your brain sometimes goes on a tangent. And that’s the best idea, you have to have that flexibility to go a new way and realise that it’s okay.

Clare 17:41
Absolutely. I think there’s a lot of strictness put around what a business should look like. And I like the fact that, you know, our business environment is very online. And it’s not the traditional office. And for some reason, 2020, like I said, that just worked for us. And that, you know, just really proves that you shouldn’t be trying to be like everybody else in that there’s always going to be problems to be solved. And there’s always going to be products that don’t hit the mark, because I think big business, especially department chains, or the cheaper department stores, can they even be called department stores, they just get something out for a season. And they just put it out there, it’s cheaply made some of the stuff is literally falling apart on the shelves, but it’s two dollars so it doesn’t matter. Ensuring that the problems that are needing to be solved are really thought through and creating products that last and it’s not just a season certainly got a lot of things that up my sleeve that I wouldn’t mind solving whether or not I’ve got the idea of what the product is yet, I’m not too sure. But I know that there’s a problem that I want to solve. Also perfecting products that we currently have. We’re five years or so in now. The earring holder, I made on day dot is not the same thing that I’m about to release, I’ve got something new coming. And it’s far, far cry from what it originally was. Well, so I think there’s always going to be changes and people give you feedback and you go, Oh, can I consider that and incorporate that into a new design? So yes, things are coming. I don’t really like to think too much in advance. But I mean, I think that’s the nice, the nice thing about small businesses that you just go where the wind takes you,

Rowena 19:12
I think about what I thought my direction was going to be for my business when I first started out two and a half years ago. And I look at where I am now. And it comes back to that having that constant awareness. Is this where I want to be, is this one I want to be doing? And how can I make some conscious decisions and movement and stuff like that. I see some business that stagnate because they don’t have that level of awareness. They just sort of keep ticking along. But I feel like innovation is so key and asking questions, having conversations, building a community, all of those things can just make such a fundamental difference. And it might just give you the next aha moment.

Clare 19:50
Yeah, I think especially being open to receiving feedback whether or not it’s negative or positive and I hate any negativity because you know, I take that to heart. It’s about me, and it’s about my brand. So that’s really difficult to hear that somebody found something difficult or this has gone wrong or the post hasn’t arrived. But I think taking every little bit onboard, and if that’s recurring, it sometimes is actually an opportunity in disguise. So I think Yeah, being open to receiving those little hints and looking out for them is really powerful. Because it does mean that you might, you might end up on a completely different path. But it might mean bigger and better things.

Rowena 20:26
Especially when you give yourself give yourself that two minutes to be like…

Clare 20:31
Yeah.

Rowena 20:32
And then just go, then let grown up, you take over? Yeah, I feel like my inner child comes out way more working in business, sometimes you just have to get better at hiding it.

Clare 20:41
That’s the problem with not having a boss, you don’t have somebody to whip you back into, you know, productive mode. You wallow.

Rowena 20:49
What would you say some of the key processes you’ve put in place to ensure that your ecommerce runs smoothly?

Clare 20:55
Oh, I think that would be so different for each business, I’m sure. Getting somebody to look after customer service was a huge game changer, mainly because I wanted to progress my business. But when my inbox was suddenly flooded, and you know, some days it was 50 emails, some days, it was none. On the days that I wanted to get something done having another 50 emails suddenly appear in my inbox meant that that was all I was able to do. And I then had to push off my to do list to the next day or the next week. Outsourcing before you think it’s ready is, is probably a really key thing to do. Because if you know that you’re getting successful, imagine if your incoming orders double or triple, can you manage that? And I think being able to predict where things could be in the next month or the next two months is really powerful thing to be able to do for yourself, because it’ll save a lot of stress later. We I think we’re coming up to our second year having our warehouse and we were packing orders up until one or two o’clock in the morning every night. And then my son was waking up at three o’clock in the morning. And then we started all over again so that we were drilling myself into the ground. And I was looking for somebody to help but I couldn’t find anybody who was going to take the care that we needed to with our product. And there was just a conversation I had with somebody and we just happened to hear about this new business that was starting that was doing small business warehousing that we handed over the reins on Christmas Eve two years ago, and that was the most amazing feeling to go well, we can now stop, you know, I’ve done all of the marketing to make a sale and somebody else is going to complete that transaction. So doing all that you can when you have to when you know if your budgets are limited. Sure. But I think it gets to the point where you’re just one person and you can’t do everything. So predicting. Yeah, I think imagining if your business has doubled or tripled, what would you do?

Rowena 22:37
Another thing that I always tell my clients is when they’re getting to that point themselves, as well as to really take stock about Have you lost time to be able to give time to your passion? Like why did you do this in the first place. And if you’re stuck writing emails, instead of designing and researching and finding the next thing for you, the progression is gonna slow down or halt or even slide backwards because you’re gonna end up in burnout zone, hustle is not a thing to aspire to, at all. And I always say look at the thing that you really despise doing the most the thing that like literally you put off the days if you possibly could. That’s where to start. You go. Okay, cool. That’s the area. For me to tell you the truth. That actually was something outside of my business. I work from home. And I kept finding that if the house wasn’t tidy, then I wasn’t being productive. And so hiring a cleaner. Wow, that was life changing.

Clare 23:36
Yeah, I hear you on that front, too. We’ve got a cleaner as well. Yeah, it was preventing me from spending time working on the business or it was eating into my workday. So you know, there are people out there who will have a business to do literally everything, anything. So it’s just finding somebody who can help and it frees you not having to feel guilty about not doing something else as well.

Rowena 23:56
And you do you do kick yourself that you didn’t do it sooner. You just go, this has made such a difference to my life. And it does flip your mindset like I have people say to me, you know, I’m a tight ass, I don’t want to do that. One of my favourite formulas is going okay, so how much would that take to do and my latest favourite term is procrasti-cleaning. So you go I’m going to clean today. And the thing that should take a cleaner three hours will take you six hours because you like I deserve a Facebook break. I was joking to someone the other day that she seems to be cleaning porn where she shows me what she’s like organised and stuff like that while I’m out doing something else. And I look forward to her messages more than I look forward to my husbands sometimes because but like just really being aware of where your energy goes it flows. So like for me, if I spent six hours doing that cleaning that six hours I could be doing work, and how much would I make during that six hours work.

Clare 24:59
That’s it and I think If you’re really conscious of that, as a business owner is, what does what did your time equate to? And how much you know if you were to earn $1 an hour you know how many dollars an hour would you be wasting doing something that you really didn’t want to do and you’re not very good at potentially it takes me six hours versus three especially when social media comes into it.

Rowena 25:20
Now this is the colour issue of Brand You Magazine. So this whole next section is about colour. So do you have an earliest colour memory or a sign that colour was going to be a part of who you are and what you do.

Clare 25:34
I have a mother who is very happy to help people explore their creativity. We were very much told that buying craft supplies, material, paint that doesn’t come with any that’s not a silly purchase. Whereas you know, buying something like a $2 top or something that’s a frivolous purchase. She would always you know, read pop into Lincraft on the weekends and I buy a bunch of fake flowers and I then make some kind of wall hanging out of it. She really let us just do whatever we wanted to do as long as it was creative. So I thought that was quite a powerful thing to grow up with. But she in terms of the earliest colour memory I think there’s a photograph of me on the ground somewhere you know outside our family home and I had some chalk and I just got all of these pictures around me that I’ve drawn on the ground. It’s still what I am now I’ve got stuff everywhere, ideas everywhere so nothing’s really changed but that you know, I was very much into creativity and I think creativity cannot necessarily be black and white. And then on top of that I, and Mum still has them, there’s a packet of Derwent pencils that are in this old cardboard which like almost about to fall apart box that kind of accordions out and it was all of the colours like crimson and you know forest green, it wasn’t just primary colours. There were all these beautiful names for the different colours and we had to if we wanted to use them we have to use the Swiss Army knife to sharpen them not to shop now.

Rowena 27:02
My dad wouldn’t let me use the special pencils until I learnt how to sharpen a pencil with a craft knife.

Clare 27:11
Is like your four year old shopping with a knife.

I think I learnt when I was about seven. It’s like literally, handed me a sharp knife to sharpen all my pencils and I wasn’t allowed to start until I sharpened them all.

There you go. Smart man.

Rowena 27:26
So many things about what you just said that reflect my childhood. Like one of my happiest places when I was a child was like Spotlight.

Clare 27:34
Yeah.

The local old lady craft shop. And it was just fascinated by like lace or the ribbon that also had all the fancy embellishments and my mind would just instantly be 1000 miles away to what I could possibly create with it to do it justice.

Yeah, I can resonate with that absolutely.

Rowena 27:54
Time just disappeared in those places.

Yeah, exactly. I think it really says something about the times we’re in right now to when kids are wearing Paw Patrol tops and things like that, or is it you know, our mums had made pinafores. And it was a different era I’m sure super powerful to be able to do that.

One of the very first things I did as soon as COVID hit was get online and buy craft supplies for my kids. Who was I kidding? I feel the Derwent pencils one like I always idolised you know the really big sets. I still go into Office Works and you know the ones in the tins 96 pencils, and I’m just like even grown up me is like oooooh.

Clare 28:38
I mean, I wouldn’t use them but I’d like to have them.

Rowena 28:42
Now this is a big question as well. And I’ve also been really enjoying the answers to this because everyone in this issue, they have a huge love of colour. And this is a pretty monumental question for some people and they’ve been finding it surprisingly hard. What’s your favourite colour?

Oh, you know what I think I’m going to be with Pantone on this one. I reckon I have a favourite colour every year I used to be blue. Back in the day it was blue everything, then it turned to Aqua, it is a bit of a nice progression. But recently it’s been green, green everything. I love olive green, forest green. I think it’s just got such a calming nature about it but the last couple of weeks orange, is really I realised what…

Could it possibly have something to do with the release of a new certain orange bag?

Clare 29:33
I think that came that, the love of orange came just before that and I realised how much I’m loving just the brightness and the happiness of it. And I always used to hate orange as a kid. So yeah, who knows what 2021 will bring might be even a red or black, goodness. Brace yourselves. But yeah, I think just happy colours.

Rowena 29:51
Honestly colour is the centre of all happiness. If you ask me. It makes everything better. And everything happier.

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