Every Saturday Pottery Barn hosts a pop-up shop to highlight local artists! Saturday September 24, from 12-4pm we will be at the Pottery Barn at Lenox Square Mall for a pop-up shop! We'll have jewelry, bike planters and more! Come say hello and get some plant jewelry!
New Stockist: Historic New Harmony at the Atheneum in New Harmony, Indiana
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Photo of Richard Meier's Atheneum from Historic New Harmony
We're excited to announce a new stockist where you can find an assortment of our jewelry and bike planters! Historic New Harmony, at the Atheneum in New Harmony Indiana is our newest stockist!
Allison at Historic New Harmony writes about the store, "It is housed in a building designed by internationally acclaimed architect Richard Meier, the Atheneum. Many of the galleries, as well as the observation deck overlooking the town and the Wabash River, can be used for receptions, small meetings, and cocktail events. The stunning building, which serves as the Visitors Center for New Harmony, houses exhibits on the communal history of New Harmony, a large theater where an orientation film on the town is shown, and the Museum Shop. Items in this shop are one of kind, handmade items meant to be adored by visitors.
New Harmony IN is a great little town on the Wabash River that served as two separate communal living experiments. First settled in 1816 by George Rapp, then purchased by in 1825. The town provided the first free library and public school system.
Currently residents of the town use golf carts to travel around and enjoy the quaint community which has connections to being utopia."
You can learn more about Historic New Harmony, the Atheneum designed by Richard Meier, and the town's history at: https://www.usi.edu/outreach/historic-new-harmony
We've Got a New Bike Planter (for Your Summer Bike Riding Enjoyment)!
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We've got a new bike planter for you to add some blooms to your green ride, and carry some flora on your bike rides this summer! The Topple Bike Planter is based on the design of one of our most popular necklaces, and we thought it would make a fun and stylish addition to your bike!
Right now this planter is available in yellow and coral, but we're hoping to make it in more colors soon. What new colors would you like to see this planter in?
Make Night Tonight with the Society of Lady Makers
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Come join us tonight from 6-9pm for Make Night with the Society of Lady Makers at Big Nerd Ranch! It's Bring Your Own Project night, and whether you're knitting, hardware hacking, or writing a novel, we'd love to see what you're making! You can RSVP for tonight's event on MeetUp.
The Society of Lady Makers is a social and professional group for makers encouraging women to be involved in the Maker's Movement. They hold make nights, social hours, and studio tours. You can learn more about them at societyofladymakers.com.
New Items Added to Our Sale Section!
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We’re not perfect, so sometimes we mess up when we make things. We’ve added a few of our second quality items, as well as some vendor samples to our sale section. All items are still completely functional, they only have a few cosmetic imperfections. Discounts on these items range from 25%-50% off. Also in our sale section, you'll find the remaining few bags of our seed bombs.
Our New Bike Planter Packaging (And How to Reuse It)
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If you follow us on Instagram or have received one of our bike planters in the last few weeks, you may have seen that we've changed our packaging for our bike planters. And the best part is, its reusable and recyclable!
This has been a continuing project since we started making bike planters about 4 years ago. When we decide how to package our items, we have a few things we have to consider:
- How does it look?
- Does it convey what the product is in a quick and visually appealing way?
- How does it hold up in shipping?
- Does it make you happy when you see it?
- Does it make you happy when you open the box from your online order to see it?
- How does it look in stores?
- Does it take a lot of work to assemble?
- How does it hold up in shipping to be displayed well in stores?
- What are the environmental impacts of our packaging?
- How much does it cost to make?
We weren’t really happy with our previous packaging. We had different packaging that we used for retail and for online orders, and always found it to be kind of dull. Since its a unique product, we had trouble finding precedents to look at when designing it.
The solution we arrived at, that we’re finally happy with, is packaging our bike planters in small polypropylene jars. This solution solves the problem of displaying the product well, and is also very sturdy for shipping. We hope that it will make people happy to see, and the cost to package our bike planters like this is similar to our older, much duller packaging.
The environmental cost of our packaging though is where we are most improved I think. Our previous packaging was a plain brown stamped box (for online orders), and a clear box with an insert for retail orders. While the brown boxes were recyclable, the plastic ones and their insert were not. Neither were really sturdy enough to be reused either. They also took a long time to assemble, and were kind of a pain to keep track of. We’re happy to have found a solution that is both reusable and recyclable (plastic #6).
Since our new packaging is reusable, we wanted to share with you our favorites ways to reuse it so far:
- As a terrarium or a planter.
- To hold small craft knick-knacks.
- To organize small parts in your workshop.
- To protect your bike planter while you're not riding, to keep it safe while not in use.
- These jars are foodsafe, so they can hold snacks! They can also be washed in the dishwasher on the top rack.
There are of course other way to reuse our packaging, but this what we've explored so far! If you've found a creative way to reuse it that you would like to share, please tag us on instagram as @wearableplanter, or twitter as @wearplants, or share in the comments!