New blog feature time! What I like most about this new feature is that it highlights what I like most about running our little online shop – meeting and interacting with amazingly creative people, and I’m not just talking about our designers. We have some pretty awesome customers too. I’m not surprised that a large number of our customers are creatively inclined, since we do tend to gravitate toward arty, conceptual designers.

I started thinking about contacting a few of our customers, who’d shared personal links and had intriguing careers and hobbies. A couple of them are personal friends (talk about being amazingly supportive).

Kimberly first caught my attention when we were filling her order and I noticed she’d included a link to her blog (yes, she has two!). I clicked over and was immediately hooked as some of her posts hinted at a really interesting day job. If you haven’t seen her clean, architectural bags yet, you’ve probably been living under a rock!

So without further delay, meet the super talented, super cool Kimberly.

1. What’re you wearing? 
Photo 1&2 : Margaret Howell linen top / vintage work pants / Building Block tassel / SSWTR pyramid bag

(See a couple more outfit photos on our FB page.)

2. Draw a picture of yourself in your favourite piece of clothing/outfit!

3. Your career is in a creative field and you make things in your free time as well. Tell us more! What’s your preferred way of expressing yourself artistically? (Share pictures of your creations if you’d like)

At the moment, I split my time between a day job designing cars at Honda’s Advanced Studio and moonlighting with Building Block.  It’s an interesting balance, as both jobs are technical and aesthetically driven, though on different levels. Both mediums walk the line between beauty and usability. 

I started Building Block after feeling increasingly detached in a corporate environment and was craving an outlet for personal expression. I’ve always tinkered around with different mediums..from bags, to ceramics, to trying to construct the world’s best sandwich! But this time around I was looking to build a concept from scratch—starting Building Block was much more of an emotional and idealogical craving rather than a routine hobby. The bags acknowledge my ideas about minimalism, luxury, honesty and humor through the use of proportion, material choices, scale, and utility.  Ultimately, whether it’s cars or bags, I’m optimistic that anything and everything can be a vehicle (no pun intended!!) for expression as long as you’re honest with yourself.

4. What do you find yourself thinking about obsessively that’s a major influence on your creative process?

At one point I was learning loose landscape drawing, and I had this really great teacher who taught me to break everything down to it’s most basic form, then design and exaggerate shapes from it.  The lesson has stayed with me for years now, and I’m always reminded of it when approaching my work.  It’s an interesting challenge using deconstruction as a design tool–removing the unnecessary and playing up the remaining elements.  At the core, it’s about how to filter through all the noise, and boil a design down to an honest statement.

5. Required reading?

6.  Recently found treasures?

• a spider web cleaning tool by an artist from Kyushu, Japan
• hand made bowl from a recent trip to Mashiko, Japan
• Japanese folk art papier mache cat
• indigo dyed embroidering thread

• Left: Slow and Steady Wins the Race sweater: no longer available
• Right: Mociun diving girl dress:
  $330 @ Anica

I’ve been digging a lot of white and grey lately.

I wore the above yesterday. I’ve been wearing the rain jacket nonstop, not just because it’s been so rainy and cool, but because it goes with everything!

• Top: Slow and Steady Wins the Race coated linen
• Jeans: Ksubi/Tsubi
• Jacket: AprilMay
• Shoes: Rachel Comey
• Necklace: APC
• Bracelets: Etsy and ebay

This is from a few weeks back. Again I’ve been getting nonstop wear out of the tunic. I bought it in a medium because I wanted it to be big. Hooray for pieces that go with anything, right?

• Tunic: J Crew
• Pants: 3.1 Phillip Lim
• Shoes: Ash
• Necklace: Rheanna Lingham

Background photos: 1 & 2