Tell us a bit about yourself.

My name is Janick, I am from Montreal, Quebec, Canada. I live with my boyfriend of 8 years, Dan and cutie cat, Kobe. I was a freelance graphic designer until July 2008, when I decided to craft full-time! My first language is French, but I grew up in an English town here in Quebec (Morin Heights) and went to kindergarten and summer camps in English, so the language has been in my life forever.

Apart from creating things, what do you do?

To tell you the truth, I don’t do much else! Haha! I love creating, so I spend almost all my time doing it, especially in Winter. But when comes Spring, I love gardening (I have a spot in the community garden for veggies and my balcony is full of herbs and flowers!) and riding my bike. These are two recent passions which I cannot sell (I tend to want to sell everything I create), so it’s really a big relief! I like to read (but I have this tendency to stop a book at half, start another and come back months later), go for coffee or dinner with friends and shop online, of course.

What first made you want to become an artist?

I would say that making things has always been in my life! I remember macrame bracelets and stitching with patterns and seed-bead necklaces being made really young! In school I took music (I played the drums for 4 years in high school) and arts, making everything from pottery to photography. I also consider graphic design as being an art form, so basically, I think I’ve never NOT been one.

Please describe your creative process how, when, materials, etc.

For jewelry, the materials inspire me. One specific bead or pendant, one specific chain or color is what triggers it all. I try something, undo it, try something else, try it on, undo again. It’s pretty much a try and fail process until I get exactly what I had in mind. I tend to be very precise, so if a pendant of a chain doesn’t fall as I’d want it to for example, it’s not good enough and I try something else.

For the Wall Wear, I start by noting in a book all the ideas as they come into my head. I design them all by hand on grid paper (I could design on the computer of course, but I find the process of actually drawing them as being much more fun and being more connected to the design). Then I get out my needles, thread, linen and hoops and get going on the color choices and the actual stitching.

I usually create new jewelry and make Wall Wear on evenings, keeping the days for jewelry production, blogging and networking.

What handmade possession do you most cherish?

Handmade pottery, especially mugs! I’m really addicted to buying clay items, and I’m sure if I had the funds (and space) to buy a kiln, a turntable, all the materials and take classes, I’d make some too. My handmade mugs collection is starting to take a lot of space, soon I will have to donate some commercially made ones to make some space! Haha! I think handmade clay items are so precious and represent what handmade is all about, from start to finish. I usually don’t contact many sellers about international shipping if they don’t already, but for pottery, I don’t hesitate a second.

Name your top five books, movies, songs/musical groups, and web sites besides Etsy.

Books:

My favorite author is for sure Paul Auster. One of his books is the first book I read from cover to cover. Without his books I think I would still not read for fun. I read his books in French versions, but would love to try out an English version soon!

- New York Trilogy, Paul Auster (I read it so many times!)

- In the Country of Last Things, Paul Auster

- Comment devenir un monstre, Jean Barbe

- Ordinary Sparkling Moments, Christine Mason Miller

- Tituba, Maryse Condé

Movies:

- Happy Gilmore

- Fried Green Tomatoes

- Amelia (Lalala Human Steps)

- The Shawshank Redemption

- Clue

I’m also addicted to TV Series DVDs. I buy my favorites and watch them over and over and over again, just like movies!

Music:

- Pierre Lapointe

- Maroon 5

- DJ Champion

- Hootie and the Blowfish

- Jack Johnson

- Dee

- Carla Bruni

It’s hard to stop!

Websites:

Besides the classics like Flickr, Google Analytics and Twitter…

- My blog, Creativadoration (and don’t get me wrong, I love it because I blog about other people’s work!)

- Perfectbound

- Modish (and the new BizTips sub-site is awesome!)

- Crust Station

- Knack

What advice would you give to artists who are new to Etsy?

To have fun with it! Try some stuff out (for example different picture styles, and see what works best with your sold items after a little while), work hard at getting better (again, picture-wise), tweak it, love it. If it’s no fun, it’ll show in your shop and in your sales!

What are your favorite features on Etsy? What new features would you like to see?

I’m so thrilled since we can track stats on Google Analytics! Very essential! I also love the Virtual Labs (you’ll find me there often) and Treasuries. But I would LOVE a way to classify Favorites with tags or sections perhaps (which I think would really help this feature being more useful for shopping), and also allow some favorites to be public and others private (I prefer keeping my supply shopping private!).

How do you promote your work?

By keeping myself and my work visible online, whether that be with my blog (I blog about others 95% of the time, but I have banners linking to my own shop), chilling in the Virtual Labs, commenting on other blogs, Twittering or buying advertising banners. It takes up A LOT of my time, but I love doing it and it has worked very well for me.

In ten years I’d like to be…

Doing the same thing, the jewelry and embroidery, but also more skills (like knitting, crochet, weaving, pottery…) and all that in one big space dedicated for it. Hopefully it’ll be in a house in the woods or a condo in the city (I don’t know what I want yet, I love both ideas!), but something to call my own where I can organize and decorate as I see fit. Right now I work in half of the office and half of the living room of my rented apartment, it’s annoying! Of course, I’d also want Nea to be established more as a brand so that sales are higher and I can eat sushi when I want without worrying about pennies. Ha!

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