The Renegade Craft Fair is both our favorite and largest event outside of the studio every year and we were pleased to be invited back to share the Press Bike with shoppers and their little ones. Our convenient spot at Booth No. 1 worked great as we caught the eye of everyone entering the Fair from the west end of the street. The Friday before Renegade is always a whirlwind of late night preparation and packing and this year was no exception. Luckily, our former intern, Lindsay, came out for the weekend to help. And to everyone's delight, Jo was able to run the Vandercook herself and put together her own print for the show.
Here's a shot of our booth this year:
We opted for using our little Chicago stars (coined 'Jo Stars') that we commissioned from Moore Wood Type, because everyone that loves Chicago loves those stars.
Here's a little print Jo pinned up to show what we were making for the weekend.
Our first customer of the day!
We started with a more kid-friendly acrylic ink, which turned out to be a bad idea. As you can see from the brayer, it was very sticky and dried way too fast given the heat of the day. Sunday we brought a rubber based ink that worked great and went on smooth.
Kids were instantly drawn to the prints and loved making them! There was a line most of the day.
And see who's eyeballing the bike in the corner there? None other than Brad Vetter, printmaker extraordinaire. He's wishing he could make such great prints!
As always, grown ups were just as geeked about it as the kids. See a theme?
Jo was again asked for autographs on the prints she pulled. "It's like being a celebrity" she commented.
Sunday we started out early with Jo meeting her friend Ella to sell their prints to our vendor friends. Next year little Coco will be joining them! Ella has learned her trade of screenprinting from her dad. We're thinking next year they should all have their own booth.
If not for selling, prints are great trades! Jo scored one of the killer Matt Daly Renegade posters this way, and two charms for her Lady Faye lava rock necklace.
Then it was back to printing!
Look who came by to check out the action. It's our favorite kids photographer, Jookie Jill!
Printing was definitely a family affair.
This little cutie was without a doubt our most excited printer of the weekend! She was so thrilled to pull this print.
The press bike really took a beating; not more than 20 minutes went by without someone coming up to print, and we ran out of paper by 6 o'clock each day. While out shopping with Jo, Lindsay witnessed folks putting their own clothes on the stars to print them, as well as arms. Wish we had some documentation of that!
Three years ago we bought our Madsen cargo bike with the profits of that year's summer Renegade Craft Fair, and we've had so many great adventures since then. Commuting by day, printing by weekend, it's been a real workhorse! We hope to keep up the fun at next year's Fair. Thanks to everyone who made this our best Press Bike event yet.
