dismantled

Etsy Shop Name: dismantled

What you sell: Handmade reconstructed and recycled clothing & accessories

Tell us about your featured item: My featured item is a flower barrette made from small scraps of recycled denim fabric. The first things I started making when I taught myself how to sew were skirts made from old jeans. I hate seeing stuff go to waste, so I was trying to breathe new life into jeans that had holes or stains. But once I was done, I would still have lots of leftover material. These cute little barrettes are one of the ways I’ve come up with to use very small scraps of fabric so that I don’t have to throw the leftover pieces away.

What do you enjoy most about running your own Etsy shop?

I love being able to set up a great looking online shop with relative ease. Just the other day I mentioned my Etsy shop to some co-workers… I got a bunch of compliments on how nice and professional they thought it looks. I also love how great it is for someone like me who makes mostly one-of-a-kind items. Before Etsy came along, that was one of the main obstacles keeping me from setting up my own online shop… it just seemed like too much work to build an e-commerce site from scratch. It’s so much easier to be able to use Etsy’s interface to offer my work for sale online.

Do you sell in any venues outside of Etsy?

The main place I sell my work at outside of Etsy is through the New Orleans Craft Mafia’s website and at our monthly event, the Crescent City Craft Market. I occasionally do other markets locally as well, and you can also find some of my work at Circle Circle Dot Dot. In the past I’ve had my work in other venues, via consignment and wholesale, but it’s not my main focus right now.