Craft Focus - Feb/Mar 2020 (Issue 77)

99 PROFILE +44 (0)113 246 0403 corinnelapierre.com Have you always been creative? I have been creative for as long as I can remember. My mother used to sew, and I have very early memories of playing with scraps of fabric to make clothes for my dolls. I constantly attended workshops where I learnt silk painting, pottery, macramé and many other crafts. I went to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris and later became a fashion designer, which had been my dream since I was about nine years old. When did you start the business? I took a career break when I had my children and decided to learn about millinery. This is how I discovered felt and completely fell in love with it. I had to learn how to make it and started to sell handmade felt accessories at local craft fairs. For Christmas 2009 I created a gingerbread man kit and it was a huge hit. I realised there was a gap in the market for high quality projects for adults. It took almost a year to start the business properly and it has been growing ever since. What are your bestselling designs? Our most popular kit is one of the earliest – the mouse family. People always seem to fall under their spell because I think they evoke a sense of childhood nostalgia. Many of our animal kits remain popular, including our penguin and polar bear. I think this is what people know me for, but in the last couple of years we have also introduced more embroidery, keeping a strong folk identity. This has been extremely well received and is something I will be working on in the coming year. How often do you release new kits? I usually launch new designs on Create and Craft TV, every six to eight weeks. Having feedback from the audience is a great way to see if a product will be popular. Who do you see as your core customer? I think we’re favoured by women in their 40s and 50s, although we do see many older and younger customers. I think of these people as friends – they are like me, with busy lives juggling family and work, and crafting is their opportunity to relax and escape. Will you be exhibiting at any shows this year? Trade shows are a very big part of the business – it’s the best way to meet new retailers and catch up with existing ones. The feedback from stockists is always essential. This year we will attend CHSI Stitches at the NEC in February and Top Drawer at Olympia in September. We have considerably reduced consumer exhibitions in the last few years but as a craft ambassador for the Creative Craft Show I will be attending some of these events around the country. You’re also a published author – are you planning any more books? Publishing a book was a lifelong ambition. I have now written three with Search Press and the fourth one will be out in June. I love the process, from planning the book to holding the first print. Designing the projects offers total freedom in terms of design and working with the Search Press team is always so much fun. What do you enjoy most about your job? It can certainly be very demanding and stressful, but I would not change it for anything else. I have so much freedom and I do what I love most for a living. Inspiring people to get creative is an amazing feeling. The craft industry is a very friendly one and I always love the contact with our customers as well as our stockists. What’s coming up next? I am looking forward to the launch of my latest book, Felt Animal Families in June and already thinking of future titles. We will be bringing out some exciting new designs that feature a lot of embroidery in the next 12 months, but I guess our focus will be on growing the team and developing our export business. We are very well established in France and Japan where we have distributors. We also export to countries throughout the EU and in the US and Australia – we want to consolidate this in 2020.