Vendor Spotlight – French Knot Studios

I’m super excited about this vendor spotlight because Audrey King of French Knot Studios is my right hand gal – she’s the genius behind most of the photoshoots I’ve done in the past year.  This girl can do it all!  And not just wedding things – she can custom create things for baby, for the home, and any kind of men’s or women’s accessories you can imagine.

1.  What kind of wedding professional are you?  What sort of services or product do you offer?

I am an “everything” wedding professional.  My goal is to give couples the special touches and custom elements to make an event truly reflect the couple.  If that means styling the whole event, or just making a bow tie, I just want to be involved.  My most popular items are custom accessories for the groom and his men.  Menswear has so few commercially available options in pretty colors and patterns, it’s all business stripes and small dots.  So I take the wedding palette and search for fabulous patterns to coordinate.  If nothing suitable can be found commercially available, I design a pattern just for the couple.   But I also do accessories for the ladies and fabulous decor.

2.  What brought you about doing what you do?  How/why did you start your business?

My undergrad degree is in costume design, my MFA is in fibers, so somehow that combination makes me perfect for the wedding industry.  It has all the organization and love stories found while working in the theatre, plus all the technique and creativity in fibers.  I don’t know that most wedding professionals follow this education path, but it worked for me.

4. What is something you’d like people to know about you or your business?

I can create just about anything (especially out of fabric, paper, and sparkle), so I love it when a bride comes up with an idea she thinks might be outlandish or impossible.  As a person who does logic and crossword puzzles in her free time, I consider these “odd” requests a challenge, and delight in a successful outcome.  It also helps provide fun ideas to the next bride I meet.  Creation can’t happen in a vacuum, so hearing new ideas from my clients just helps the creative process.

5.  How do you find inspiration?

Inspiration is everywhere (such a cliche, but also very true).  Most often I find it in the words and images provided by my couples, but I also wile away the hours on Pinterest.  You should follow me! http://pinterest.com/frenchknot/  I am always pinning!  And when I try a pin out, I’ll edit the caption to include any helpful hints I discovered.

6.  Who are some artists/people you admire?

rtist/People I admire… Bob Mackie hands down!  Sparkle is my favorite color, and I love things that are colorful, over the top, and traffic stopping.  Bob Mackie’s work is all of these things.  I also love artists who take ordinary things and turn them into extraordinary works of art.  It creates a definite sense of “why didn’t I think of that”, but the genius is in the simplicity.  Notable artists: Tara Donovan, Susie MacMurray, Stuart Haygarth, and Devorah Sperber.  Recently, Krista Janos of Blue Eyed Yonder created some great wedding elements out of many, many paper plates, and thousands of plastic spoons (separate installations).  Of course a lot of gold spray paint can bring almost anything to the wedding world.

7.  What are your top 3 favorite things to do in your free time?

Only three things?!?!  What?!?!  No fair!  When I get free time, I love to spend it with my husband (usually something really low key like movies at home), going to art museums and galleries, and embroidering.  (Getting coffee with my favorite photographer, game night, simple social gatherings, shopping, going to fabric and trim stores, traveling, going to the movies, baking, gardening, home improvement projects, planning and throwing parties…)  All of these are in no particular order.  Except the husband one, that is first by far!

8.  What is your ultimate vacation?

As a self proclaimed art geek, I would love to go on an art tour of Europe and see all the original works of the hundreds (maybe thousands) of masterpieces I’ve studied in 7+ years of art school.  It’s always amazing when you see the actual piece and how your perspective changes i.e Monet’s Waterlilies are HUGE, while Dali’s Persistence of Memory is quite small, just slightly larger than a sheet of paper.  Yet in Art History class, they appear as either small thumbnails in a text book, or giant in a slide show.  Though I fear I am in the minority of my friends and loved ones when I think this would be a killer vacation.

10.  What is your greatest extravagance?

My greatest extravagance is the ridiculously expensive bag of lace, rhinestones, and ribbon I just bought to make the bridal sashes of your dreams.  At least that was the most recent…

11. What do you most fear?

Fear… YUCK!!  Fear is a huge inhibitor of success, so I try not to think about it.  Instead, I’m going to go with my dislikes… negative people, onions, and all white weddings (Boooo!!!!)

12.  What living person do you most admire?

I admire my Mom a lot!  She is a very successful entrepreneur, the ultimate giver, and one of my best friends.  She is creative, smart, savvy, and throws the best parties.  A lot of who I am today is from her influence, and she gives great business advice.  I hope one day to be as successful as she is, both in life and in work.

13.  What’s your spirit animal and why?

My spirit animal is a house cat.  They are always well taken care of, sleep most of the day, and get lots of massages and hugs.  I forgot to add sleeping to the free time question.  That’s number 1!  … I may have mixed up spirit animal and what I want to reincarnate as… I’ll stick with it either way.

My greatest achievement… still working on it.  I’ll keep you posted!