I vended the 5th Annual Psychobilly Luau this past weekend, which is the largest psychobilly get-together on the east coast.
With awesome giant banner action!
What is psychobilly, you ask? From Wikipedia:
"Psychobilly is a fusion genre of rock music that mixes elements of punk rock, rockabilly, and other genres. It is one of several subgenres of rockabilly which also include thrashabilly, trashabilly, punkabilly, surfabilly and gothabilly. Psychobilly is often characterized by lyrical references to science fiction, horror and exploitation films, violence, lurid sexuality, and other topics generally considered taboo, though often presented in a comedic or tongue-in-cheek fashion. It is often played with an upright double bass instead of the electric bass more common in modern rock music. Psychobilly gained underground popularity in Europe beginning in the early 1980s, but remained largely unknown in the United States until the late 1990s. Since then the advent of several notable psychobilly bands has led to its mainstream popularity and attracted international attention to the genre."
I attended both Friday July 22nd and Saturday July 23rd of the event, at Public Assembly and The Bell House, both in Brooklyn respectively. I never did an even like this, so I wasn't sure exactly what to expect. I had had a bad run of vending at street fairs and flea markets and really wanted to to expand my fan base but wasn't sure exactly what types of events would welcome work such as mine. Then my friend Laura Rebel-Angel get ahold of me about vending the Psychobilly Luau this year, which I had seen posters for in previous years but never had a chance to get out to. I'm always bad at going to shows like these just as a spectator. I don't get out much and when I do and it's a scene I admire but am greatly intimidated by and don't have much personal exposure to I often find myself awkwardly hanging out on the sidelines with friends who have no idea what's going on that I drag with me. So at least having a table set up people can come to me, see what I'm all about and I get this illusion of being involved even though I'm actually a dorky shut-in. Plus it gives me the opportunity to make a little extra scratch on the side. ;)
So along with Meredith, my longtime pal from Maryland up for the weekend as my trusty helper I set up shop Friday evening at Public Assembly in Williamsburg to an overwhelmingly awesome crowd of folks who were super in to what I had to offer. My best friend Fenny even sent up some of the custom-made paper hair flowers she creates for her Little Asian Sweatshop store on etsy to sell for her. Her most popular being roses she crafts from playing cards, like the one pictured below, which were a HIT! Out of the 20 she sent me I have 2 left! Craziness! If you wanna get one for yourself head on over to her etsy store and check out all her goodies!
check them out in her etsy store
I also had my iPhone Square card reader for the show, which I still had yet to properly use (as most convention centers are lacking in phone signals). I must say the ability to read credit cards really put my vending success at the Luau on par with some of my best comic convention table experiences! I really hope I'm able to get some wifi at Baltimore Comic Con coming up, because getting that extra business would be beyond awesome, as people are apt to spend more with a credit card as we've been somewhat conditioned to think of it as not 'real' money.
in the works!
I have been playing around with 'fancier' renditions of my jewelry, as I am fascinated with all things sparkly- especially rhinestones. I blame burlesque. So I got these super cute cameo frames that I put my artwork in, but I felt they needed a bit of extra oomph and working my dayjob in the Fashion District I'm constantly passing all these stores with excellent rhinestones and beadwork. So I eventually learned that one way to attach them to pieces is by these fun little things called headpins, and thus A NEW SUB-OBSESSION IS BORN. So now I'm concocting a separate 'line' of Paigey jewelry that's gonna be all fancy-schmancy with sparkles n' stuff. I'll be adding these new pieces to my etsy store in the coming month and you can also see them up close and personal once Baltimore Comic Con rolls around at my Artist Alley table .
Now if they could only get that AC working...
and to go up on my etsy store soon!!
I'm definitely going to be back next year to vend for the show, it was a whopping success and I'm already talking to Fenny about her coming up to vend as well with MORE hairflowers and even more goodies that's she and I will be creating between now and then.
Wanna see more pics of the event?
Papermag has a great photo essay right here and Sailor Jerry (one of the sponsors) has some great coverage of Saturday on their Facebook page!
