“Our generation is being sold a lot of lies and crap using the language of ‘handcrafted, authentic, and artisan,’” Connie says. It’s a sentiment the company is acutely aware of. While that doesn’t describe East Fork’s relationship to pottery, they have encountered a few who tag their work as overly precious or twee. A lot of people with varying degrees of talent monetized their hobby. The relatively accessible medium lent itself to burned-out millennials who wanted to use their hands for something other than UX design and needed a “meditative” hobby. Connie says she saw the trend growing about eight years ago, when ceramics shops popped up on Etsy and the fashion world began to collaborate with certain makers in Los Angeles and Brooklyn. On the wish list is space for a day care.Įast Fork happens to be peaking at a time when ceramics are, well, hot. With the help of friends from Shelter Design Studio, they transformed 14,500 square feet of leased industrial space into an “organism,” with a clearly defined factory floor and start-up–style office area, as well as a commercial kitchen and a 30-foot-long dining table, where the staff eat lunch together. As a whole, the company is planning for 300 percent growth in the next two years. The new factory will allow East Fork to increase its production capacity by 800 percent by 2020. After nine years on a former tobacco farm in North Carolina’s Madison County, the Matisses moved their production, marketing, and shipping headquarters to Asheville’s Biltmore neighborhood last fall. It sells 5,000 pieces of pottery every month.Įast Fork recently took its biggest leap of faith to date. That sincerity has struck a deep chord among East Fork’s clientele, allowing the Asheville, North Carolina–based company to open two new retail stores (one locally one in Atlanta) in the past year, and it’s why the company’s Instagram account-featuring mostly dinnerware-has more than 70,000 followers.
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