Origin, The London Craft Fair, 2008, part 2

Quote of the week, or possibly of the moth:

“My star customer at Origin was someone who owns Edmund de Waal's wall of pots
but feeds her children off my tableware.”

This from Linda Bloomfield, she of the delicate pink interiors.

So Origin 2 was, well, altogether more upbeat than week 1. If we consider the Crafts Council’s stated aims, one of which is to create a viable economic infrastructure for the craft sector, then this was an unqualified success, as far as I could see. It would be a truly ground breaking achievement if countable numbers of makers could generate a sustainable living wage from making and selling their work, assuming that’s what they want, without needing to be from a class or family background which is able to provide a trust fund, or help with the mortgage, or similar, to keep things afloat. The acid test of this is if a critical mass of women from non-moneyed backgrounds can achieve that even if they are single, or have no obvious access to money. Then you know you’ve got an infrastructure not just a sprinkling of exceptions, or a group of people who’ve netted higher income partners. If they can achieve that, I’ll be cheering them to the rafters, however ‘naff’ ore over perfect the craft is.