Introducing... Maribel Made!

1. DaWanda Shop Name: Maribel Made
2. DaWanda Shop URL: http://maribel.dawanda.com/
3. When did you open your shop? Maribel Made was founded January 2008
4. Are you in the DaWanda Shop Directory here? Yep, http://dawandashopdirectorylinks.blogspot.com/
5. What Category are you under? Boutique (mixed product)
6. What do you sell? I sell stuffed animals, hats and earrings at the moment. Basically, whatever I make goes into my shop so it'll be a variety of work. I consider them my works of art. 7. Describe 2 of your current products.

Two of my favorite and most distinguishable products are a stuffed whale and a hat you can wear two different ways.

Jebby the Whale was painstakingly designed from the ground up. Trying to imagine a 3d figure in your head and applying it to a pattern was hard. I made about 6 iterations of the pattern and what I came up with in the end was a lovely baby sperm whale. He is sewn on a limited edition, vintage Scalamandré print called Pompeii. The fabric consists of 80% cotton and 20% silk. Materials used to make him are glazed satin, white acrylic felt, polyester fiberfill, glass eye and eye hook. Jebby the Whale is a Physeter Cathodon.

The second item is a hat I called the Britney Hat. This one took me a while to get just right. I was going for the sexy trilby hat you see so much on celebrities in Hollywood. To complement the contrasting color band I crocheted a flower called the Bourbon Rose, designed by Megan Mills (see rosehowto on http://megan.cc/). The hat serves two purposes. It can be worn as either a sexy trilby hat or a cute bucket hat! I personally love this hat and I'll definitely be making one for myself.




8. Tell me a bit about you...

My name is Maribel Castellanos and I'm an artist living in London. I began making stuffed animals, hats and earrings at the end of 2007 because I needed an escape from much work in graphic and web design. At the time, I lived in a small place in Seattle, WA in the US and I lacked the space needed to paint or do large-scale drawings, so I looked to the small things I could make in our living room. I moved to London soon after and I had the opportunity to dedicate myself to my art full-time.

My work is focused on "Small Things" and represents the things I can make with my hands. The items I have on display are only a few of the things I love to do. I'm very versatile, but the thing I love to do the most is draw. I also look forward to transforming some of my drawings into digital artworks and paintings.

Art, fashion and music are a huge influence for me and I can spend long hours contemplating new ideas and plucking away tirelessly to the sounds of the right music.

9. Do you have a website, or blog?

I just started a blog to promote my work. See, MaribelMade.com. It's still in the works, but in time it will look more like a real blog. I plan to update it with works in progress and thoughts related to design, art and possibly music.