Papercon 2019

March 28, 2020August 7, 20201 Comment

This con was held last October 3, 2019 at Elements Centris – Prosperity Hall. At first, we had no idea where Prosperity Hall was. We were used to just Elements Centris during Komiket. When we asked the organizers, it was just half of Elements Centris HAHAHA.

Prior to the event, I had to review the guidelines numerous times so I could explain and brief to the team. One of the things that I noticed is that they gave us an ample booth size – 2 meters by 2 meters! But they only provided a 4 feet by 2 feet table. Different units of measurement, but just convert one to the other. When I made the 3D mockup, we still had around 0.6 meters on the side for more visual merchandising space. I had this approved to the organizer before bringing in our JanMakers table. And that’s my tip for conventions, I guess? Read the guidelines thoroughly!

Anyway, Hannah and I went earlier than usual since we have the extra table. When we arrived at the venue, there was already a long line outside even though its just 8am!

Left side of the table. Featuring Clair’s and my works. ♥

Cork board for her stickers. Acrylic stand for my post cards. ♥ I bought the stand from Shopee!

It was a good decision to print a lot of my postcards! They were my best sellers for the day. ♥ Some customers even went to Papercon so they could specifically buy my postcards. Some even asked for my autograph! Our friends from IG, officemates, and loved ones also went to the event in support of us. Sobrang nakaka-kilig and nakakataba ng puso. ♥ These are the reasons why I kept participating in cons.

The mesh wire featuring our stickers. ♥

Various baskets for the sticker sets and individual stickers for our budget-conscious customers.

This was also Shine’s first convention! She’s one of my earliest IG friends (lol) and we used to do art tambays together with the rest of the JanMakers team back in Makati. She’s always supportive and always attends our events. This time, we asked her to join our team. Look at her cute stickers!

Momo the Hedgehog stickers by Shine! ♥

I LOVEEE the Skyscapes set! ♥

Right side of the table

Jeckrie and Sha also went to the event. They’re officially our Ops Manager and Marketing Consultant HAHAHA. Thank you so much for supporting us! ♥ I also met a LOT of flower artists that day. I was so happy that I finally met them in person. ♥ I’ll feature them in the next blog post!

How was our first Papercon experience? It was wonderful! (The income was nice too HAHA). The merchant application will open on April 4, 2020. I hope the rent price will be okay! We’ll apply again.

So sorry this blog post took a while! I wanted to be in the right mindset to write this post. I wanted to focus so I could remember all of the wonderful stories that day. ♥

https://www.instagram.com/p/B3RJISsH3IE/

Papercon Prep

March 22, 2020August 7, 20201 Comment

Last year, after StickerconMNL2019 and Baguio Craft Fair our January Makers PH team had no events lined up for the rest of the year. When Papercon was announced, we were hesitant in applying at first due to the rent price. But after a few weeks of discussion, we eventually applied. Gambling on a first time con is a big risk, but I believed that it would be a successful one. And so by August to September, it was back to the con prep once more.

New watercolor pad favorite: Canson Watercolor XL pad!

As per every con, I wanted to sell new products. I think its good marketing that invites people to get first dibs on your new product. (If you have fans, I guess?). For me, well, I wanted to paint my new pencil case which was a tilapia lol. Then it reminded me of the Filipino meme that an ice cream in the fridge is usually 50% real icecream or 50% fish/meat/or any ulam. So I went with that concept “Trust Issues” HAHAHA.

I tried my best with lettering ok.

The final product. ♥

Printing time usually looks like this.

My office desk.

During that time, I also made postcards so my supervisor can give these to our designer counterparts in the US during her US business trip. I printed more in preparation for Papercon. I ran out of postcards because my officemates bought them. I had to print some more! It was a good thing that Hannah and Shine were also going to the print shop that weekend.

After printing, we found a korean cafe lol. We had our own cubicle!

Yasss foods.

Cutting a huge batch of stickers is tedious, but I’m so glad I have a support system! Thank you to my officemates once again for cutting my stickers while de-stressing in the office. ♥

Feb Komiket

February 2, 2020August 7, 2020Leave a comment

Happy to announce that January Makers PH will finally be a part of Komiket! See you on Feb 8 to 9 at Megamall, Megatrade Hall B. Our tables are #115 & #116! Credits to Hannah for the poster. ♥

Agueda Pinta Cookie Workshop

December 28, 2019August 7, 20201 Comment

A few weeks after Daluyong, my friend Dandi announced that she was going to have her first Pinta Cookie workshop at Papemelroti! I’ve blogged about her brand Agueda Manila a lot of times here in my blog. You could say that I’m a pinta cookie veteran lol.

The workshop kit consists of 1 square cookie, 2 round cookies, a hexagon cookie, and a paint brush. The “paints” were also included, and we were given the freedom to choose our own colors in our palette.

Hi Dandi! ♥

Some of the paints that we could choose from. ♥

I was grouped together with my blockmate Tin. The first cookie we painted was the rectangle cookie and we were to paint wood grains. It reminded me so much of our first year in UST doing our “plates”.

With the rest of the class. ♥

After painting wood grains, Dandi and her team collected our cookies for drying. Next up is the Hexagon cookie and marble painting! ID na ID ang peg HAHA.

My white marble paint. ♥ How do you paint like this? Just like watercolor. Add a generous amount of water or vodka, and then add the paint on the dry parts of the cookie for detail or on the wet parts so the paint would spread.

Beautiful marble tiles with gold leaf! ♥

The next tasks were floral wreaths by Sav and my own flower painting demo. I did a quick peony painting on my square cookie. Insisting everyone to use liquids on the cookie and letting the paint do its magic. After my demo, everyone had free time to create their own subjects on the square cookie.

My floral wreath that consisted of poinsettias and berries; my peony painting demo; a rose painting for Tin (referenced from a rose given to her by her boyfriend).

Tin gave me her extra cookies YAY so I did more flower paintings: a blue hydrangea and an anemone.

After we finished painting, everyone got all of their cookies for coating with corn starch.

Coating your cookies with corn starch will give your cookies a matte finish. And its quicker to pack since waiting for the paint to dry will take a while!

I also saved my IG Stories of this event in my Highlights.

Overall, it was a fun and successful workshop. Congrats again, Dandi! I hope there will be a part 2 workshop soon. I’ll volunteer! ♥

Please follow Agueda Manila on their Instagram or Facebook page. Thank you!

Daluyong Opening Night

November 9, 2019August 7, 20201 Comment

A few months ago was my first ever exhibit at Pineapple Lab. Inggo and I went to the exhibit after our work. What we didn’t expect was the heavy traffic since it was a Payday Friday. So we walked from my office all the way to Rockwell Guadalupe.

There’s not much else to say, really. I felt proud and giddy when I saw my paintings up on the wall. I wished my bbs good luck, and we went to Rockwell for dinner. I bought an XL watercolor pad as a reward for myself. And then we went home.

I think its because I’m just writing this now that I can’t remember all the details of that night. After a month in Pineapple Lab, I had a Lalamove driver pick up my paintings. Nobody wanted them, so I proudly display them now on my office desk.

Baguio Craft Fair

November 3, 2019September 23, 20213 Comments

2021 Edit: latest wordpress updates botched up the photo sizes. I’ve been trying to fix this but to no avail. Not sure if I would still bother fixing it.

A few weeks after Sticker Con MNL 2019, 3/4 of the January Makers PH team went up north to Baguio for the Baguio Craft Fair 2019. Jean participated in this fair a year ago and said it was a good event. Since Hannah and I wanted a quick vacation, we went with her this year.

Baguio Craft Fair is on its 4th year. It was held at Mount Cloud bookshop, near Brent International School Baguio. When we arrived on Day 1, it reminded me so much of our Metro Manila version – 10a Alabama Arts & Crafts fair. It was held at the open area of the place, with different crafters selling their wares under the huge makeshift roof, or even under the pine trees.

Picture heavy post ahead!

I met someone famous! Meet Pacha the mountain dog. ♥

What about us? We were located under the pine trees HAHA. No worries though! Since we’re in Baguio, where the weather is cool and the sun is not that hot.

seamountainco’s handmade watercolors, clay palette, and a bit of my stickers.

My flower stickers. ♥ I find it funny that they’re more interested with the bird rather than my stickers lol.

Hannah’s mom also asked us to sell her handmade knitted booties. They were our best seller HAHAHA.

I also brought some of my printed bags! (This was during Day 2)

We took turns manning our booth. Sometimes I’d wander off and get coffee (they encourage everyone to bring their own utensil/tumblers). Or sometimes I’d take photos of the place and just breathe the fresh air.

I was mimicking bemzenit’s post card HAHA.

My lunch. Hannah took this photo. I have no idea why HAHAHA.

We also had an extra task for this trip – which was to take decent photos of our products. Thanks to the huge space, we had lots of areas we could take photos from. It was also in our aesthetic – which was nature. Reasons for these photos to be announced hopefully soon!

It rained in the late afternoon, so we had to pack up and cut our bazaar time earlier than expected. For Day 2, the organizers moved the vendors located in the open area to inside the house.

We had more space to display our products. More space for my postcards! ♥

Anddd that’s it! Thank you for sticking around until the end of this lengthy post. Based from this experience, I would conclude that this event is really similar with 10A Alabama. The crowd prefers more handmade items rather than stickers. My postcards and bags were a hit here, I should have bought more original works for sale lol. Oh well! Here’s to another good experience. ♥

Will we join again next year? Hmm, we’ll see. ♥

Daluyong

August 27, 2019August 7, 20201 Comment

I am proud to announce that I am part of Pineapple Lab‘s watercolor exhibit entitled “Daluyong“. ♥

Pineapple Lab presents Daluyong, a group exhibit featuring the works of emerging artists who have shown proficiency and artistry in the medium of watercolor.

Collected from a call-out that engaged over a hundred entries, Pineapple Lab has curated a show that exemplifies the versatility (and volatility) of this deceptively simple medium. With a diverse selection of watercolor works on a variety of surfaces, Daluyong looks to prove that this delicate medium is a force unto itself. Celebrate the rainy season with us as we dive into the world of watercolor!

Daluyong opens on August 30, 2019 at 6 PM. Works will be available for viewing starting August 30, 2019 to September 20, 2019. Pineapple Lab Gallery at 6053 R. Palma Street, Barangay Poblacion, Makati City. Operating hours are 11 AM to 6 PM from Tuesdays through Friday.

During my final interview at Studio West, they asked me what are my goals in the future. I remembered that the first thing that I answered was to be featured in an exhibit or art gallery. Nothing office related, I think! And then a year later, it happened! Pineapple Lab had an open call for artists and I applied. I’ll be attending the event on Friday with my Inggo. Hope to see you there. ♥

Art Trade with Argie

August 11, 2019November 7, 2021Leave a comment

Homhayghad. This blog’s been hibernating for a while. I had some personal issues that made me unmotivated from doing my usual routine. The issues are not yet addressed, but I’m fighting it! ♥

Anyway! During my hibernation, I still saved my photos into folders for future blog posts. One of those is an art trade with a friend of mine on Instagram: Argie_Mae! She was one of my first IG friends. I really love her ink drawings, one glance at her works and you know that it’s her style. When I asked for an art trade last 2018, I was so happy that she accepted! This one took a while since we were both busy with work, but we finally pushed through with sending each other our works this 2019. And it was worth the wait!

Her original art! I love these soooo much! ♥

More original art, and stickers! ♥

I usually joke online that she’s my washi tape fairy god mother. And sineryoso na niya on this trade OMG. ♥

Bigla ako nahiya sa sinend ko: just my original watercolor painting and some stickers. I need to send my new stickers to her soon! This was the painting that I sent to her:

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A post shared by Paulina Dennise (@suffnirain)

Keds Shoes artwork

May 19, 2019August 7, 2020Leave a comment

Early this year, someone asked me to paint her white Keds shoes since it was already dirty. She gave me the creative freedom to paint whatever subject that I want on her shoes – so I made peonies.

I only had red, yellow, brown and green acrylics on hand. Since I didn’t have the time to buy additional paints, I settled on peonies as my subject. This was also the first time that I painted on Keds, so I have no idea what I’m doing.

My acrylic mixing paper plate.

Done! ♥

The sides were also dirty. I decided on painting leaves / mini peonies to these as well.

And done! I was satisfied with the final product. I want to do more of this in the future! ♥

Office Photoshoot

May 10, 2019August 7, 2020Leave a comment

A few months ago, I had an impromptu photo shoot in our office for my artworks. It was perfect timing since this was before our office furniture reconfiguration. Some furniture from the swing area were relocated somewhere else (I have no idea where yet lol), while some were put into storage. (Goodbye for now, swings!)

My favorite artwork so far. My peony painting!

Zoomed in goodness. ♥ Also featured here.

Most of my paintings are from my old Canson watercolor pad from college. I decided to finally use them all up before I buy more watercolor paper. I believe my artwork results from this pad are brave and confident. The mindset was that, since the paper is already old, I might as well let loose and experiment. ♥

I need to get that mindset to new watercolor paper. Argh!

One of my earlier paintings from this watercolor pad.

Sunflower.

I really hated this one. Halfway through I lost the motivation to paint this since I thought that I messed up the flowers. So I switched to my basic prang set and painted the greens and background.