I'm Marina Flournoy, an artist who used to work in the computer industry. Now I'm using the Internet to help shoppers connect with people who make things by hand.
We're drowning in a sea of mediocre mass-produced stuff that has little value and comes with high costs (e.g., the effect on societies of questionable manufacturing practices and on the environment of high volume mass-production). Most of this stuff is not made to last or even to be all that interesting. It's just made to be sold. But there are lots of people who handcraft things that are useful, beautiful, unique, and made to last, the kind of things we called heirlooms back when we knew what that meant. These people and products are all around us and many of them are on the Internet where I can link to and tell others about them.
I work primarity through these sites:
- Heartful Village - Website devoted to promoting handmade products and artisans
- Handmadebyartists.com - Heartful Village blog
- One Hundred Percent Art - Fine art greeting cards by contemporary artists
Heartful Village is home to Handmade Lookup, an easily searched directory of people who make things by hand. I want people to see handcrafted treasures as viable alternatives to mass-produced products. Please get on my mailing list, and tell your friends too, ok?
Thanks.
