KOiPOD Salon ...into the fold

Lucky for me, I had a great kick-off to my holiday sales when CARTER SAFARI was brought into the fold on Saturday, December 6th for "HANDMADE" - a handcrafted holiday gift fair at KOiPOD salon on SE Belmont. Below are some pics of the impromptu set-up, along with some links for the salon. Many thanks to Kahala at KOiPOD for setting this up, and to Jessie at OWL apparel for the invitation.



For more information about KOiPOD, which is located at 3224 SE Belmont St. Portland, OR 97214, Click here: KOiPOD
And here: January 19th, 2007

For more information about Jessie's Brand, OWL Apparel, check out the Owl's Hole by clicking here: Rock & Roll Art to Wear.

Union Rose!

Carter Safari can now be purchased at Union Rose, a small boutique in the City of Portland, Oregon. This store is filled with lovely products for Women and Children, and even a few items that cater to men. They also carry jewelry, notecards, and a wide selection of locally made products.

To look at the UNION ROSE,website and view the location and store hours, Click here on UNION ROSE blue text.
Or, go to www. unionrosepdx.com. Have fun with the holiday shopping! Stop in to Union Rose now!

Nice to meet you!

Hi, I'm Alia, the new intern for Carter Safari. I've been working with Carter for a couple of weeks now, and I'm really enjoying it. I've been cutting fabric, sewing together panties and taking inventory, and although it's tiring, it's definitely fun for me. And since the Art Institute has an Internship class, I'll also be getting college credits for it! ^_^
Well, that's my intro! I'll post again in a week or two!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Alia =^..^=

Hubble Paint Job Finished...

The new Hubble Studio in the North Coast Seed Building is pretty great. After a few days of fixing up and painting, along with some new curtains, the place was looking pretty sharp. Here of some photos of a more finished product (studio).










Also, now that it's time to get to work, I've been working on some new items, with the help of my new intern. She will be posting soon, so I will leave it up to her to introduce herself and post some blogs.

New Studio

In June, CARTER SAFARI
moved to a different
location, where I was
able to finish up 80
pairs of undies for
Spring 2009!



As of October '08,
CARTER SAFARI has yet another location, although this should be more permanent.

The Hubble studio is located in North Portland at the following address:

2127 N. Albina Ave. #214,
Portland, Oregon 97227


The new studio is great and it is wonderful to have that extra space in my home available to me now for other uses. Here are some "before" pictures from when the Hubble was first acquired as a rental studio space.



The Hubble Studio is shared with a friend who is a lingerie representative. For more info. about the other lines she reps, take a look at her website: BlanCap Sales

Spring Shopping Affair

Here are some photos of the set-up at the Spring Shopping Affair from April 5th & 6th, 2008



If anyone is interested in going or participating in simialr future Shopping events, Contact Kim at SugarMama Bath & Body. (Check out her products while you are there! Great scents for body lotion, bath stuff- It's great!) Go Here!
www.sugarmamaproducts.com

A New Era

As May nears its end, CARTER SAFARI embarks on a new beginning. Honestly, I have been reluctant to post a new blog as there have been a lot of changes in my life as of late. The last blog written by Kayla Rae made reference to an April 5th & 6th shopping event in which Carter Safari was present as a vendor. That was a new & interesting experience in which I may participate again in 2009. It is called 'Spring Shopping Affair,' and this year it was located in Oak Grove/Milwaukie Oregon.


April was a month for finishing projects and gathing supplies for the future, along with some time for a vacation break. I needed it. Also, much time in the month of April was spent searching for a new home & studio.
May has been very busy. New fabric orders have been received, new underwear prints are in production, as well as a new underwear style. Now, along with the thong, the tap short, and the no-wedgie underwear, there is the cheeky brief. Look forward to seeing more of these:


I have been packing up the home and studio for the move, and in the midst of all of this, CARTER SAFARI was a participant in the Alberta Street Art Hop. It was so hot! 95-97 Degrees and I must have spent at least 6 out of the eight hours in the direct sun. If anybody has a canopy for sale, please consider selling it to me! Anyway, with such extreme temperatures (for Oregon), many ladies were excited about a new pair of panties. I had one young man come by very interested in my men's shorts, so hopefully he will contact me for a pair in his size. He had mentioned wearing them to the "Burning Man" festival. At any rate, sales were good, and the event was fun. I encourage anyone to go to the Alberta Street events in the future.

I hope to have the new studio set up by June 5th, and look forward to getting back to work.

Thanks for reading my blog!

Crunch Time

Today has been a busy day. I really got a lot done quicker than normal maybe it was because of how fast Carter is moving. My only problems today have been getting out of bed and the darn sewing machine giving me trouble. The weekend is rapidly approaching and Carter is on edge because of her fashion sale. I can tell she is really stressed, but I know she is excited. She's got a great collection of spring skirts, and some other neat stuff like undies and men's shorts. Today she is all over the place, giving me a task and buzzing off on her own. Most of the time I'm not sure what direction to go in but keeping Carter focused is enough. What's with the sun today? It's beautiful outside. Anywho come check out some of the stuff in person this saturday and sunday, the admission is free!!! for more info on the Shopping Event check out http://sugarmamaproducts.com/ look under News & Events, we look foward to seeing well really anybody.

kind of proud of my very little part

I seem to be putting this off. When I first started working with Carter, I was a nervous wreck when it came to using the machine, or even cutting fabric. This was the task on which I made my first big mistake, and since have been seeking reassurance in every move. However, here lately, I have been finding myself more confident in my work because I am getting more familiar with my surroundings. Just knowing how something is supposed to look keeps me from doing something entirely wrong. The creative wheels in my head are turning once again and i feel overwhelmed with ambition these past few weeks. I'm turning off the t.v. to turn on the sewing machine, who would have thought. Sewing is a great stress reliever and just look at some of the stuff I'm working with; I'm kind of proud of my very little part. I love having Carter to talk to and I am the most excited about a skirt as I ever have been. It's hard to try to sell Carter's works because they aren't my own but hopefully things will come through and i can start making some progress on this pretty soon.

My friend Dino

I received a phone call out of the blue the other day that I was happy to receive. It wan Montavilla calling to let me know that my machine wqas ready to be picked up- the service repair was complete. I was taken aback. I had thought that I traded it in, and had regretted doing so. When I called to get it back, the owner had told me that he had already repaired it and sold it. I was pretty bummed. But! The good news is that he was mistaken. It had not yet been sold, and I still had the ticket for repair. I now have 4 sewing machines! Crazy! Here is a picture of the lovely Dino, my old dinosaur (he gets his name from the rurrawruh noise when he sews).



Not the prettiest machine- a little blocky, but works great, overall. I'm keeping the Janome because that's fun, too. It is just a different animal. More like a rabbit. I have not decided on a name for it yet.

New Machine

In January, my straight-stitch machine had some problems as the timing was off. The timing refers to the relationship between the upper needle(s) and the lower looper. This caused skipped stitching. That's not good.

So, I brought my ten year old Pfaff 6091 Varimatic into the local sewing machine supply store for repair. They said that it would take about 2 weeks to repair, and I can remember there was a line around the building of sewing machines waiting to get in like it was the hippest night club in town. The fact is, as my friend Jessie put it, "I think Montavilla is running a racket..."

It's not that there is only ONE Sewing machine shop in town, but this particular one has many locations & pretty decent prices. Plus, they have been in the business of selling & servicing sewing machines for years. Needless to say, I had a two and a half week setback.

Funny thing is though, two weeks after I brought my sewing machine home, the timing fell off again. Sadly, it seems that setting the machine to button hole mode activated the disruption in service. I began wondering if it was worth it to have these re-occurring set bAcks. At least Monatvilla gauruantees their service for a year. They were more than happy to take a second look at it & do any further repairs for free. Ultimately, I felt that going forward, any future setbacks would not be worth-while, so I traded up.

Buying a new machine was tough. I was so attached to my Pfaff 6091 Varimatic. I knew there were added features installed on newer sewing machines, though, even on the cheapies that fell into my budget range. I figure that I can always trade again in the next year or two depending on how well business is running. At this point, I just had to pick and choose.

My final Choice: Janome Decor model DC3050



For more info, go to http://www.janome.com/index.cfm

Goodbye DINO! Thanks for all of the goodtimes, my dinosaur!

Hello! Janome! Looking forward to all of the fun & new projects we will have together.... Must find you a name, though!


Readers, any suggestions? It's relatively quiet, and sort of sounds like a tape cassette rewinding!


Signing off now,

CARTER SAFARI

Hello I am Kayla

I didn’t know what to expect when I got the e-mail from Carter saying she wanted to teach me a little about the world of designing and making clothing, but the idea seemed fun and she knew that I was totally oblivious so there wouldn’t be much pressure. In the past couple days that I have spent with Carter I visited my first store solely dedicated to fabric, also I made my first garment I could actually wear. My friends barely believe that I made it. She is currently teaching me about patterns and cutting different types of fabrics. Today I starting making a skirt…I never thought it would be this much fun, but I am always frustrated. I get stuff tangled up all the time and Carter has to keep me from getting mad and stuff. Hopefully I’ll be able to help more than destroy. I am anticipating all that I learn and all the help I can provide- maybe find out if this is a place I fit in.

January 2008

This is the first Blog. Today marks the end of the first week with an intern at CARTER SAFARI.

k. is helping with pressing, and cutting and a little bit of sewing. She has minimal sewing experience, so we are taking that slowly. We are getting things going and she will be posting pictures as the items are completed.

As part of her internship, I have given her the assignment of posting blogs. She seems to be into the idea.

I will sign off for now and let k. get more into detail regarding who she is, where she comes from; she will tell you what cartersafari is all about, the general concept, and what we do on a daily basis.

Cheers!

cartersafari