Travelling Menagerie at Here and Now Gallery
July 2nd–July 31st 2010 (private view July 2nd 6-9pm)
Here and Now Gallery, 41 a Killigrew Street, Falmouth, Cornwall, TR113PW

Organised by one of our very own Pica Pica girls, the London Zine Symposium is dedicated to zines, comix, art, and all things DIY and homemade.

Check out the what’s on section of the London Zine Symposium Website for full details of workshops, talks and stalls.

London Zine Symposium | Saturday 29th May 2010 | 12-6pm | The Rag Factory, 16-18 Heneage Street, London E1 5LJ

Women’s Library Zine Fest
And for those of you who either can’t make it, or just absolutely love zines, over at the Women’s Library, Zine Fest 2010 will be taking place on 12th June, 11-4pm at 25 Old Castle Street, London. Check out the facebook event page for more details.

Live in London? Looking for something to do with your bank holiday weekend? Love jumble sales and beautiful illustration? Leona Baker (formerly Lady Luck Rules OK) has a new series of special rummage sales based at the Superette store dedicated to her pursuit of second hand delights! She’s invited an amazing assortment of talented illustrators to spring clean their studios, homes and have a good ol’ fashioned clear out, so come along for the chance to meet and support independent makers! Tea and homemade treats on offer to sip & nibble on and extra special goody bags for early birds!

See you there at 12 sharp!

RUMMAGE!
#1 – The Illustrators’ Special
The arty afternoon jumble sale!

Sunday 2nd May • 12noon – 5pm

Superette
66a Sclater Street, Off Brick Lane, London E1 6HR

Click the cover for the Pica Pica Digital Edition!

After months of blood, sweat, tears, needles, thread, pens and pencils – Pica Pica Magazine is finally online for all to see! Our print magazine has an extremely limited run on beautiful 100% recycled paper and a very special screenprinted cover designed by Steph Says Hello, but unfortunately you’ll have to put up with it in pixel form for now. But it’s just as good, we promise. From in depth interviews to quick and easy makes to our favourite independent designers of the moment and everything in between, we hope you love reading Pica Pica as much as we enjoyed putting it together!

Just click the cover above or the thumbnail in the sidebar to see issue #1 in all its glory!

Here at Pica Pica towers, we’re getting excited about a brand new craft/club night in London! It’s Blue Peter meets Art Attack while Anne Robinson watches on and it’s free! The Nottingham folks amongst you might remember it’s predecessor ‘Jumpers For Goalposts’ at the Alley Cafe, so here is its southern reincarnation ‘Come Get Felt Up’!

So, how does it work? At 8pm, you’ll be given a theme and get to grab your materials and start making.. you’ll have until the band stops playing to finish your creations (and this month it’s breakbeat three piece Yonioshi from Nottingham). The band then judges and the winners will get fantastic badges and mega prizes that will blow your mind! The launch night is on the 22nd April.. see you there!

Come Get Felt Up! at The Book Club
Leonard Street, Shoreditch, London
22nd April 2010 8 till late!

Calling all crafters! Have you ever daydreamed about setting up your own craft shop, selling beautiful jewellery and handmade products? If so, you’ll be pleased to hear that Pica Pica caught up with Michelle Rudd from Birdy’s Boutique who did just that!

What is Birdy’s Boutique?
Birdy’s Boutique is an independent shop based in Lincoln and online.
At Birdy’s we sell a wide range of clothing including dresses, skirts, cardigans and leggings as well as handmade jewellery by many designers including Kitsch-Tique, JiJi Ki Ki, Love From Hetty & Dave, Mozzy Pop, Plastic Bat and our own jewellery designs. We also stock a wide range of handbags and purses, as well as scarves and a fabulous selection of cosmetics by Jelly Pong Pong and Stargrazer.

What is your background as a designer?
After completing my A-Levels in Art & Design and Design & Technology, I decided university wasn’t for me, I wanted hands-on industry experience. At 19 I started working as a Trainee New Media Designer for Home Entertainment, who later changed to Choices UK. Since then I have worked for several design companies, working to improve my skills as a full time Graphic Designer. I have always been interested in crafts, from the age of 16 I would spend endless hours making handbags and purses out of scraps of fabric. Nine years later, I now design and make items for the boutique, we stock our own greeting cards, felt brooches, jewellery and small fabric purses.

How did Birdy’s begin and what was the inspiration behind it?
Owning a boutique seemed a great way of combining my love of fashion, design and business. In October 2008 I opened Birdy’s Boutique in a small Shopping Mall in Lincoln. Within seven months we’d moved to a larger premises, five times the size of the original boutique to accommodate the expansion of Birdy’s and the brand.
I’m often asked, ‘why is the boutique called Birdy’s? My partner actually nicknamed me Birdy, for my ‘bird-like’ expressions. So the obvious name was Birdy’s Boutique!

Michelle at Birdy's

Reasons for location?
Lincoln is a great tourist location and has a large university. Even though there’s a lot of competition in Lincoln with other boutiques and independent shops, Birdy’s definitely offers something new & original.

What was your main objective when starting Birdy’s?
My only objective for Birdy’s Boutique as a store, was to create a great shopping environment for customers, where they could browse the rails and try on beautiful dresses in our spacious fitting rooms!

Did you receive any funding to set up the business?
I had my own investment money from savings.

Have you got any tips for people looking to set up an independent craft business?
The best advice I can offer anyone looking to set up their own business is to be patient, be organised and have a plan. Try to be realistic when putting a business plan together, think of what you’d like to achieve and then make it happen.
Stay focused, it will take time to build up regular customers and for people to pass on the good news about your business to their friends!

Pica Pica would like to thank Michelle for her interview and wish her every success with Birdy’s Boutique in the future!

It’s competition time over at Lucy’s Happy Place! Illustrator, crafter and designer Lucy Farfort is giving away a hefty haul of lovely stuff.

You can win the Whale and Me art print, shown partially above, a handy Robot Love canvas tote, a zippy Russian Dolls pouch and a Mini Monsters pad for all your doodles and notes.

You have until May 13th, so to check out all the goodies and enter the competition click here.

Even if you don’t win, there’s still something to smile about as the lovely Lucy has provided a tutorial for the Russian Dolls pouch. Have a go at making your own here!

In issue one of Pica Pica we investigate the murky world of intellectual property theft and copy cat designers. It’s taken a while, but thanks to cases such as Hidden Eloise vs. Paperchase, the mainstream media have begun to pay attention to the problem. Ahead of the pack, open blog You thought we wouldn’t notice… has been calling out the copycats for a few years now so we spoke to them to find out a bit more about the site and the inspiration behind it.

What inspired you to first set up the blog?

I come from a street-art background and I was seeing so much of my own work & that of my peers used without our permission. Most of the time it is just not worth a legal battle but I thought it would be nice if we could at least let people know that this was happening.

Was it always an open blog? And why did you choose to do it this way?

Yeah from the start I wanted anyone to contribute. I knew I couldn’t supply enough content from what I see, and it also meant that it would include much more subjects than I was knowledgeable in, such as music or web.

From your own experience, do you have an example of the worst instance of someone copying someone else’s work?

Im not sure if I can think of an all time worst, but just the other day I found out that some was having a photography exhibition where 13 out 16 photos were just photos of my art and the price was 3 times what I would charge. Im always flattered people like my work but not so when they are cashing in on it.

Do you have any tips on the best ways for artists to protect their work  and fight back if this happens to them? Or do you feel it’s just too difficult?

You can never guarantee protection of your designs but what you could do is never get anything published, never show anyone your folio, never post your work on the web, never exhibit in a gallery or show it to your friends. But that would really make all your hard work feel pointless. That is just the risk you have to take in putting your designs out there, once you have been ripped you have to consider if it’s effects you in anyway, along as it doesn’t hurt your image it sometimes can be a good thing.

It may benefit you if it exposes your art to a wider audience and no one is cashing in without you getting a cut then whats the harm. How ever if it is damaging to you finically or may effect your profile then work on minimising the damage by doing things like sending a cease & desist asap. (You don’t need a lawyer for that either just look one up on the net.)

Do you feel the internet is a useful tool in fighting this kind of thing? And do you know of any examples where something posted on your site has resulted in a company withdrawing a product they copied?

The net has helped a lot, now that most companies are found through an internet search they rely heavily on having good PR on the net. So when there is a story posted on YTWWN about brand X, it comes up when searched. Because there is so much traffic on the site that when someone searches Brand X the YTWWN story will pop-up as high as second or third in google like “Brand X ripped of Mr Y” This always gets their attention, it is a PR disaster for many companies. I’ve had many take down notices & other legal threats but I will only take stuff down if it is incorrect, uncertain or if the victim requests. So yes there has been several companies withdrawing products due to the site.

You offer guidelines on your site as to what walks the line between inspiration and blatant rip off, could you perhaps elaborate on where you deem the line to be?

If you can put 2 items side by side and the look the same it usually a rip. but if they just have the same style then it’s more than just inspired, sometimes things get a little bit too inspired. Like if you design a bike with the same colour way as a painting you like that sounds fine but if paint a painting with the same colours same content then it may be a bit too inspired.

Many thanks to YTWWN for taking the time to answer our questions!

Here’s a lovely video put together by our production director Elena Biagi, it features excerpts of the hard work (and sometimes silliness) we’ve all had to put in over the last 3 months to build our brand and a first issue.. phew! Our faces are in their too, just in case you were wondering what we looked like!

In the next few weeks, we will be launching the digital edition of issue #1 for everyone to have a looksie at.. all of our wonderful contributors will be sent their very own beautifully printed copies in the next month our so, providing the queues at the Walworth Road Post Office aren’t too mental.

Have you ever wondered what happened behind the scenes at Lady Luck Rules OK?

Discover the ins and outs of running a successful independent creative company from design, sourcing suppliers, creating production techniques, setting up a website, how to to sell your goodies online, PR and marketing, wholesale, the boring stuff like book keeping, employing staff, organising events and much more. Learn from LLROK’s experiences, successes (and mistakes!). After their recent closure, you will also find out a little of what’s in store for 2010!

To book a place at any of the 3 talks and for more info, see ladyluckrulesok.com.