local markets :: i love kutchi

hello there friends, how are you feeling? how did your week start? i hope in a very good way! yesterday i ended my day with dinner & movies, we watched the new woody allen movie, have you seen it? what did you think about it? i love the 20’s… so i found that whole story charming! moving on to our story of the day… the {local markets}! today it will be different! instead of a single artist/designer or photographer… a project, that includes all of these! i was approached by a girl, and she introduced her project. it was a shop located in barcelona. a project that gathered several portuguese artists. so far, so good, i thought! let’s see the pictures! i always think about the pictures, and i am very strict about the pictures i share. a project may be the top of originality… if the photography part is sloppy or plain bad… i will say no. no matter what. and i like to keep things that way. so when i moved to the photography part, i was happy. and i wished i was in barcelona. just to pay a visit to her, say hello and give her my very best about such beautiful idea! her name is mara. she is also an artist… and the one behind {i love kutchi}.

let’s read mara’s story by her own words, shall we?

“i’ve grown seeing my grandmother sew in a big inbuilt iron sewing machine and it always fascinated me the patience with which she transformed some meters of fabric in a beautiful skirt or dress!!! i remember the first time i went into a haberdashery with my grandmother… i was maybe 9 years old and i can still scent the fabrics!! there was a big jar full of buttons, of different sizes, colors and shapes, and my instinctive reaction was to put my hand inside to feel them! still love to do that…

a drawing teacher gave me my first graphic diary at the age of 14 and told me to never be afraid to draw or register the things i saw and liked! between skylines, buildings, feet and polaroids, there were always some funny character, sewing pattern or a sample of fabric… only in 2007, at the age of 24, i decided to start my own blog under the name {i love kutchi}, a name my friends gave me because i was always laughing and had lots of tickles (kutchikutchi). since then i’ve been more and more seduced by the love i always had for sewing and the will of having a happier life, dedicated to the small and simple things in life.”

“after leaving, by my own choice, my job as an architect, i started to fill my days doing some of the projects i’ve left behind in all of my old graphic diaries. although i’ve been doing things since 2007, in parallel with the blog and some craft fairs, only in 2009 i started to dedicate my full time in spreading my work… and this is how the ilovekutchi shop is born: from the attempt to be happy, to live each day with a smile…to create a place filled with fantasy, warm colors and small doses of handmade love… a little corner with scent to ‘sweets’, pink chicks and softies that come alive at night! Inspiration comes to me from my daily routine, children laughing, butter cookies…by the smell of milan rubber, crayons, old books and post-its… dots, stripes and squares…”

“nowadays, after a bit more than one year, our ‘kutchi-family’ has grown! we are now over 25 artisans, including myself, mainly portuguese and spanish, creating and working together as a team to offer kids and adults lots of cute handmade items! currently we have a special “project: a showcase just for you!” were we offer a space in the shop’s lateral showcase to display the items of one single artisan each month!! this way, we can show all the work from the artisans that already work with us, and also, most importantly, new and emerging artisans.

barcelona ‘was introduced’ to me as the perfect location to initiate this adventure! the ‘heart of arts’ (as many would say!) was, first off all, my architectural ‘retreat’, were i worked and learned as an architecture in my first years of arrival. and the more i discovered about this city, the more i loved it… specially the unlimited resources, on every levels… and i had no doubt, by the time this project began, that the shop had to be located in barcelona, and most of all, in the neighborhood  that received me from day one, barceloneta!”

“i would say that the biggest challenge for me is to bring the handmade ‘culture’ near to people, making them appreciate and value the love for details… to see a kid having the time of his life playing with a fabric handmade softie instead of a videogame, or spending hours ‘making up’ fairytale stories with knitted puppets… is priceless!! and this is what encourages me to continue to work and create new characters and stories, new products, new showcases… working one day at a time, enjoying each moment!”

“and to all of you, who have chosen a more ‘creative life’, i would say: keep on! it will be really hard to make a living out of your work, and you will have people saying the most various things to you… but you know what? you’re happy, you enjoy it… and there will be a time were you will be able to live of it. just be patient, keep trying and have a ‘kutchi-actitude’: if you feel the world doesn’t smile at you, try to make him tickles!!”

don’t you just feel the need to jump to a plane and head to barcelona? i am feeling like that… i think that inside our deepest thoughts of our creative lives… we all dream about a place like this. and i am not sure about you, but barcelona has this magical mood… maybe just like mara said… it is because of the artistic way of life you breathe in barcelona. i was there once… for four days. and i went to visit a friend that was studying there… design, what else? this seems to be a magical place, where only good thoughts and smiles get inside. all the other grumpy moods stay outside the door. you can explore more about this project {here} + follow on facebook {here}! have fun!

images: i love kutchi