Hannah Pickering of Hannah Pickering Art
https://www.etsy.com/shop/hannahpickeringart

Facebook: Hannah Pickering Art
Instagram: @hannahpickering
Twitter: @hannahloveswes
Pinterest: @hannahloveswes

Name, age, location: My name is Hannah Pickering. I’m 25. I live in Nashville, TN.
How long have you been on Etsy?: I have been an Etsy seller since May, 2013.
What is your speciality?: Painting with acrylics. I make customizable abstract designs, paint photo-realistic flowers and leaves, and do hand-lettering.
How did you know that your speciality was a gift from God?: I’ve always loved making things. As a little kid, anything artsy was a favorite activity. Yet as I got older, art was something that became less and less important until I didn’t draw or paint at all for several years. Then, right after graduating from college, I found myself desperately needing a creative outlet and God renewed my love for painting. In 2013, newly married and newly relocated to Nashville, I wanted unique wall art to decorate my house with and couldn’t find what I was looking for – so I made it! I thought other people might be looking for my style of art, too, so I opened my Etsy shop. Knowing that my art is a gift from God is a relatively new realization for me. Arts and crafts had always been something that I’d enjoyed but never thought of as particularly important and definitely not something that was my exclusive calling. After running my Etsy shop for two years, it started feeling like it was eclipsing my real calling – music and ministry – and I seriously considered closing my shop and giving up on painting altogether this summer.  However, God used many people (both close friends and complete strangers) over the past few months to speak into my life and creativity to refine and refocus the purpose of my art.Now, rather than just making art that I think is interesting and hoping it sells, I focus on making art that has a positive message and points people to God. This shift in purpose has shown me that God has plans for my art – and that my specialty is a gift from Him.
What were you doing before Etsy?: My Etsy shop has always been part-time; my “real job” is traveling the world and leading worship with my husband. Before Etsy, I guess you could say I was a student. I started my Etsy shop right after college (I have a bachelors degree in Biblical Studies from Moody Bible Institute). Although my degree has nothing to do with art, it has everything to do with the mission behind my little art business.
How do you get inspired?: I find inspiration everywhere! Reading Scripture, being surrounded by nature, browsing the latest trends at my favorite shops, spending way too much time on Pinterest.
Tell us about your workspace: My art studio is a small sunroom on the back of my 1950’s cottage style house. It used to be a porch but was converted unto a laundry room long before my husband and I bought the house. Before we moved in, we moved the laundry hookups into a utility room and now I have my desk right where the washer and drier used to be (you can see the original cabinets right above my desk). It’s so personal and cozy – I love it!
Favorite verse?: John 13:34-35 – “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

 

Kelsey of ProjectWildflower
https://www.etsy.com/shop/projectwildflower

Instagram: @project.wildflower

Name, age, location: Kelsey, 22, California (Central Valley)
How long have you been on Etsy?: I opened my Etsy shop in late February of this year. I haven’t quite pursued making it as successful as I would like for it to be, but I plan to focus even more time and attention on it in the coming months ahead.
What is your speciality?: You know, to be honest, I don’t know that I have one. When you look at my Etsy shop, you don’t see one thing in specific, and you most likely never will. I chose to name my shop ProjectWildflower because I am so infatuated by the way that wildflowers grow so freely and with a sort of reckless abandon. They are not confined and are unencumbered by any restrictions as to how and where they grow in the wild. It has become sort of a project in my life and for myself to be intentional as to grow and develop in the same way that wildflowers do; with a free spirit, a sense of bravery, and an unwillingness to conform or to settle. Along with that comes my hunger to try new things and to push myself to create anything that I’d like to. You will see though, a variety of woven wall hangings available in the ProjectWildflower Etsy shop. I taught myself to weave in early February and have fallen in love with it, so I plan to always have a few weavings to choose from in my shop. Painted wood slices also seem to sell really well for me. I have just pretty recently listed them in the shop, but at craft events and fairs in which I have had booths, they have definitely been the biggest seller. So though I don’t have a specific specialty, weavings and wood slices are most likely going to stick around for a long while!
How did you know that your speciality was a gift from God?: Crafts, and just sort of creating, has always come very naturally to me. I’ve never forced it and I have never lost even an ounce of passion that I have towards crafting. I think that when someone is so passionate about something that it becomes sort of their safe haven and what they look to when they want nothing to do with anything else… that is when you know that the Lord created them with the intention to live out said passion. I know I’m supposed to create. Just as Christ creates the most extraordinary things out of dust, out of nothing, I want to create beautiful things.
What were you doing before Etsy?: Before Etsy, I was still creating. I have always loved to make things, and decorated my apartment with a good amount of items I made myself. I ran out of places to put things, but still wanted to create, so I started to giveaway my creations as gifts. I just graduated college in May, so school was my main focus. Papers and exams sort of took over my life for those four years, as well as managing my local ice cream shop, which was really fun.
How do you get inspired?: I always think this is kind of a tough question, because I really don’t know! However, I do know that color pallets inspire me. I was once in a Target parking lot, and had parked my Jeep next to a flowerbed. There were really light colored flowers filling the soil, blue, yellow and purple, next to the black asphalt parking space. Thus, the Greater is He wood slice was born. A black background with white lettering, just as the parking lot was black asphalt with white painted parking space lines. The words are trimmed in pale blue, yellow, and purple flowers, just as the flowerbed trimmed the parking spot. Interesting, right? Point being, there is inspiration everywhere. It comes in all forms, and I am open to being inspired by the most random situations everyday.
Tell us about your workspace: Oh boy. My workspace is all over the place. Currently I don’t have a designated area that I work in, however, I plan to in the very near future. I’ve been working on how to turn one area of my bedroom into kind of a mini studio type space for all of my ProjectWildflower doings. I weave on my bed and I sketch on the couch and I paint at the kitchen table and I staple in the back yard and I glue things in the entry room and I sand in the driveway. Like what? I’m really a hot mess 24/7.
Favorite verse?: This is always hard for me. The Bible is composed of so many powerful and promising verses that fill me with a sense of calmness and make it so hard to choose. But Hebrews 10:23 never fails to leave me with a feeling of such comfort satisfaction, and hopefulness. “Let us hold fast the profession of our faith, for He who promised is faithful.” Our God is a faithful God. He always has been and He always will be.

 

Kristin Hornstein of WinsomeEasel
https://www.etsy.com/shop/WinsomeEasel

Instagram: @winsomeeasel

Name, age, location: Kristin Hornstein, 28, Nashville, Tennessee.
How long have you been on Etsy?: I opened my Etsy shop in June of 2014, so just a little over a year.
What is your speciality?: Hand-lettering and illustration.
How did you know that your speciality was a gift from God?: I’ve loved words for as long as I can remember. From the time I was 12 or 13 I’ve kept a small journal of quotes and phrases I found truth in, and I’ve always believed in the ability of words to transform the world. Think about it: words have the power rally or ruin a cause, to build up or tear down a whole nation, and to heal or break a heart. Hand lettering just made sense for me because it married my love of words and my desire to create. I don’t know that there was a specific moment when began to think about creating as a gifting, it felt more like a waste or act of neglect to NOT be making things. At some point I just I started playing around with different mediums until I found a style that seemed to work for me, taught myself (through many frustrated tears) how to use photoshop and illustrator, and set up an etsy shop. There have been countless missteps and moments of “well, that didn’t work” since then, but I’m slowly learning to refine my voice and create work I love. And even on the hardest days, there nothing I’d rather be doing!
What were you doing before Etsy?: Surprisingly enough, I was working as an office manager for a financial firm. It was about as far as possible from full-time creative work, but through working there I learned incredibly valuable lessons about running my own business, managing my finances, taxes, etc. As my Winsome Easel workload grew, it was very harder and harder to balance my day job with owning my own business, but doing both let me build up savings to give me some cushion as I transitioned to a full-time maker.
How do you get inspired?: I look for inspiration anywhere there is truth and beauty. I work outdoors as much as possible, and almost always take a walk before beginning a long creative session. I also listen to music nearly constantly, and have a rotation of artists who’s songs just say it, you know what I mean? And yes, Instagram feeds and Pinterest can be a great source of beauty as well, but I think the number one place I find inspiration is from relationships. Almost every piece in my shop has come from a moment in time with a good friend. A couple I love was battling infertility, so in faith I made the print I would want to give them for their nursery. (They’ve since has a beautiful, healthy baby boy!) Another friend shared a lyric with me from a song that she was clinging to in the middle of battling cancer, and that turned into a print. Another friend, a soon-to-be groom, was relaying to me a story about his finance’s favorite literary quote, and it struck a chord in me. I created a piece for them using the quote, which turned not only in to their wedding gift, but also a piece for my permanent collection. Every piece I make has a person behind it, and those people and their stories are my ultimate inspiration.
Tell us about your workspace: Though I have grand aspirations of working out of a studio space with plenty of storage and abundant organization, that dream is still a ways off! Thankfully, I’m blessed to have gracious roommates who let me use a bonus space in our house as a workshop!! It’s simple but functional, and has amazing natural light. My two cats are my constant shop companions, which of course, is plus as well.
Favorite verse: Psalm 73:23-26 is my life passage: “Nevertheless, I am continually with you; you hold my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”