Welcome to our introductory newsletter, "Filling Your Creative Well."  In this world of uncertainty and economic challenge, we are hoping to bring you some monthly inspiration to help you develop and grow your interior design business.  With some time on your hands, perhaps now is the time to tuck away some beautiful design inspirations for future projects.  Enjoy!

  FILLING YOUR CREATIVE WELL 

"A brief visit to Nepal started my insatiable love for Asian art."
Richard Ernst, Swiss physical chemist and Nobel Laureate

My own love for Asian art began when my husband and I adopted our daughter from Korea 10 years ago.  By filling my creative well in an unexpected way, my passion has evolved into designing Tibetan wool and Chinese silk rugs for the interior design industry. 

Julia Cameron, author of "The Artist's Way," talks about filling the creative well.  Cameron suggests that we need an inner reservoir to draw from if we are going to continue to create.  She describes our reservoir or well as a creative ecosystem that we need to care for.  "If we don't give some attention to upkeep, our well is apt to become depleted, stagnant, or blocked."  By giving ourselves, what Cameron calls, an "artist's date" once a week, we can nourish our creative self.  A trip to a beading shop, a walk in the woods or even watching an old movie are all examples of ways to regenerate.  An important aspect of the artist's date is doing it alone so we can enjoy and absorb what the experience brings without concern for others.

"I've never had so many good ideas day after day as when I worked in the garden."
John Erskine, American educator and author

Without these opportunities for alone time, we can feel overwhelmed...perhaps by commitments which are not really getting us where we want to go.  We need time to keep track of our ideas.  I would suggest that, if you don't already, carry a sketchbook or notebook with you at all times and write down your ideas as they come.  Keep the book in your purse or briefcase and by your bedside so that those ideas that occur while you are driving to the next meeting or when you are putting on your mascara or shaving cream in the morning can be recorded and reviewed at a later time.

Another way to keep your creative well full is to learn about products and services outside of the interior design world.  Seemingly unrelated things can be connected in strange ways to create new inspirations.  A well-known example is the inspiration for Velcro which came when George de Mestral, a Swiss amateur-mountaineer and inventor, decided to take his dog for a nature hike in 1948. They returned home covered with burrs.  de Mestral took a closer look at one of the burrs and was inspired to use the same idea as a fastener. 

As designers, most of us are lateral thinkers, a term coined by Edward deBono, and as a result, we generate many of our ideas by making unique links between very different thoughts and ideas.  I am a member of a panel for Idea Greenhouse, an ideation company in Minneapolis, and we spend our sessions linking divergent thoughts and ideas to create new products for consumer companies.  These types of links can be useful inspirations for communicating to and creating for your clients in a unique and effective way.

Have a design-filled day!
Julie Dasher

We are a licensed importer of the Rugmark Foundation, working to end child labor in our weaving communities. Thus, we donate a percentage of our profits to get kids off the loom and into the classroom.