Even though I didn’t get a booth this time at the Gift Fair, I usually make sure I stop by- just to see what amazing things people are doing. After walking the aisles for 10 minutes, you can feel that things are still a bit slow for 2010. It wasn’t as busy as everyone hoped. On the plus side, people jumped at the chance to talk to someone us. The following are a few booths/things that caught my eye in the Accent on Design section.
Nervous System
I met Nervous System when I exhibited at the ICFF Design Boom Mart last summer. It’s great to see that they have their own booth this time. Their black and white booth and custom fixtures make a definite impact.

NS booth

Nervous System Pendants

Nervous System products and cool fixture.

AIAIAI
I’ve been a huge follower of AIAIAI. Their design aesthetic really appeals to me. I’ve been shopping around for one of these earphones, but I’ve never made the dive. I’m so glad they had a booth and after seeing the products in person, I think I will snatch one up soon.

AIAIAI ear buds

AIAIAI headsets

Headset packaging

The American Design Club (AmDC)
AmDC equipped with a new logo, concentrated on the a new design conscious newsletter they will be releasing. It was nice stopping by and catching up with my buddy and AmDC member, Henry Julier. Also, I love the new piñatas. I want!

AmDC booth ( Liz is a pinata head!)

AmDC, pages from the newsletter.

Loyal Luxe
Produits nouveau genre pour animaux! This is for Kegan. She’s been browsing for one of these online and was ecstatic when she saw them here. I have to admit, these cardboard play houses are surprisingly intricate. And after watching the kitty videos on the website ( where they are playing with the houses), I wished I was a had a cat.

Neo-Utility
I believed Design Glut mentioned Neo-Utility last time around, but I am always impressed by their collection of smart products/ companies they represent. I was impressed with IDEA International’s simple yet functional iPhone/iPod stand and their cubic kitchen timer.
Oh, and I’m still a huge fan of Boskke’s Sky Planters.

IDEA International's cubic timer and iPhone stand

Boskke's Sky Planters

Thorsten Van Elten
Again another great collection of beautifully designed and functional products. I always see a lot of the products in various design shops around the city. By the way, Thorsten is one funny chap!

Property Of….
Property of… is a fellow bag company. I was lucky enough to meet Jasen of Property of… two Gift Fairs ago (It was their first one ). Through him, he introduced me to the two founders and designers a few months later. They are really great guys and it was really generous of them to want to talk to me ( a young bag company just starting out). Since then, Property of… has blown up and are in all the big stores. I walked by their booth and it just keeps getting bigger and better every time. Property of…has great products, no doubt about that, but I want to shift gears a bit and talk about their booth.
The booth is wonderfully design and crafted. So detailed! (Especially the wood/ bag focal wall and the fixtures.)
I found out The Official Manufacturing Co. designed and built the booth for them. They are new and small Portland-based Design company consists of 3 members. They specialize in almost everything. From design and fabrication of furniture/fixtures to branding and identity. I’m dying to interview them. I hope they say yes.

Property Of...focal wall. (photo via Offical MFG.co)

Property of... booth (photo via Offical MFG.co)

Reclaimed wood panels..i think (photo via Official MFG.co)

That’s my 2 cents on the NYIGF this time around. I had a good time visiting the fair with Liz and Kegan. I’m wondering what caught their eye? Although, it might be the same stuff since we did walk around together.

I also printed the Skinny Vinny Lookbooks on my ink jet printer at home. I bought a pack of nice paper from Staples and a few sheets of cover stock from a stationary store. Having the books professionally printed would have set me back about $500. I didn’t need more then 30 books, so printing them and binding them myself wasn’t too big of a task. Even though it did take me a while, I loved working on them and adding my personal touch to every piece is what I like to do.

When it comes to materials or supplies for my bags, money is usually not an issue. I want the best materials for my product and I rarely compromise. However, during the process and designing phase I have done things that was pretty ghetto. When I’m designing, I would make a sample pieces out of muslin to test out proportions or how the bag would hang. In the beginning, I didn’t have muslin or fabric to make the samples, so I made my sample pieces out of my old childhood bed-sheets. I therefore had a bunch of bags with Teddy Ruxpin or Rainbow Brite on them. ( Just to clear the air, I never slept on Rainbow Brite sheets as a kid, they were probably my cousin’s.) Eventually, I ran out of old bed-sheets and my mom wouldn’t let me cut up her curtains so I made the move onto muslin.

It would be great if I have the resources to do things “officially”, but sometimes, I just don’t. Things seem to work out fine for me so far so it’s no biggie. I also think that being resourceful like that is kind of fun.

Hello There,
My name is Vincent and I am the designer/founder of  Skinny Vinny. Design Glut asked if I would like to contribute and informally blog about my adventures on here. My answer, Heck yes!
I’m really flattered that they asked me and I hope my adventures are up to par with the ones they have all the time.
Skinny Vinny is a Design Studio based in Brooklyn. We currently have a collection of utilitarian bags out on the market. We will soon add more bags to that collection and also working on some side projects. Stay tuned and I hope you find our stories interesting.

Skinny Vinny
www.skinny-vinny.com

I know you were involved with overseas manufacturing – why did you make the decision to go that route, and how did you find a factory?

Growing up, my mom worked in a garment factory. To save money, rather than going to day care, I spent a lot of time in the factory. I would help out and I learned pattern-making. So when I started Skinny Vinny, I planned on using her factory. It turned out that they didn’t have the right machines, though, to go through all the thick layers of fabric. I couldn’t find factories here. But my mom has childhood friends back in China, and I got hooked up with a factory through a friend of a friend of a friend. It was really small; they don’t work for overseas clients.

I ended up going to China for a month or two to figure the factory thing out. I speak Cantonese, but all the workers spoke Mandarin. It was horrendous. I had to completely rethink my way of communicating. In school, I was taught how to do technical drawings, but I found that the factories didn’t read those well. I had to get them a real prototype to get the best results. I sourced fabric in the markets, and almost got pickpocketed. And they didn’t do deadlines well.

I finally got to the point where the samples looked good, and came home. I’d told them to make a second set of samples for their reference. They didn’t, to cut costs, and they “forgot how to make them,” so I ended up having to send the samples back. Then they skimped on materials. I started working with a second factory in China, which was much better but they had huge minimums I would have had to order, and I couldn’t do it. So I ended up buying a machine and doing the production run here.

How do you incorporate sustainability into your company?

A percentage of every sale goes to the National Resource Defense Council. I wanted to create everything out of eco-friendly materials, but as a small business, I just can’t afford them. It’s so expensive, about ten times more.

What led you to become a designer?

I went to public high school in Brooklyn, where we had one art class. I knew I wanted to do art but I didn’t know what exactly. When I started thinking about college, I was planning on staying in New York. I applied to all New York schools as a fine arts major, with one exception: I also applied to the design program at Carnegie Mellon University [in Pittsburgh]. When I interviewed there, I fell in love with the facilities. And so I ended up in design school.

How did you transition from design school into into the world of manufacturing and selling objects?

Like everyone, I found that looking for a job after school was hell. A connection through a friend led me to an internship at Pollen. After 3 months they asked me to stay. I was there for almost a year total. It was design boot camp: school doesn’t teach you a lot! My time there really increased my skills and boosted my confidence. After a while, though, I started to feel that the soft goods industry would be a better fit for me. I wanted to combine industrial design with my pattern-making experience. So I left Pollen and started looking for something new.

I planned on eventually starting something, though definitely not this soon. But when I couldn’t find the kind of job I was looking for, I decided to just go for it. I figured it’s easiest to stumble when you’re young. My bags are all designed from a ID point of view. I see them as products, not fashion. They’re functionally driven rather than decorative.

How has the internet helped you as an indie designer?

The bags recently got posted on NOTCOT, which sparked a lot of interest. From that, other blogs picked them up – Refinery29, Coolhunting… And that led to little boutiques emailing with orders.

What advice would you give to young designers looking to start manufacturing and selling their products?

I wouldn’t say I know everything there is to know about manufacturing. I take it a day at a time and sometimes I have no idea what I’m doing. I do have some funny stories though. For example, be very specific about everything you submit to the factories. My experience with Chinese factories is that they take everything very literally. I once corrected a sample where a seam had been put in the wrong place by drawing a red line where the seam needed to go. The next sample came back with all red seams!

Also, don’t be afraid to stand firm when dealing with the manufacturers. I once had a factory whom made a lot of excuses and cut corners. For example, I specified to them to use really nice hardware. On the samples they used it, but when it came to the production run they said they “couldn’t find” that hardware anymore, and used something much cheaper. I told them to find it, and stood my ground, and they finally did. It wasn’t easy because they came to me and said my standards are too high. I was kind of taken back by that statement. I just wanted to put out the best product I could.