2019 has now past – and what a year it was for us! Before we completely jump into 2020 we wanted to take a look back at all the adventures and changes the past year has brought for epiphany studios. From adventures abroad and crowd-funding campaigns to retirements and new members of team epiphany, it’s been a big year for us. Keep reading to see our 2019 in review.
An exciting event that kicked off our new year was the launch of our new La Ruche lighting line. To debut these gorgeous beehive inspired coiled lights, we packed them up and took them to New York City for the Architectural Digest Design Show (ADDS). Each year ADDS showcases work from the top designers and artists around the world. This was such an exciting show to be a part of and we made a lot of great connections while in the Big Apple.
You can see our beautiful booth to the right, which not only featured the various shapes and sizes of La Ruche, but the gorgeous Tangled II chandelier that April had debuted at her solo exhibition at the Saginaw Art Museum from Oct. 2018 – Jan. 2019.
La Ruche has been quite successful throughout the year! People have been drawn in by the organic shapes and textures of these light fixtures and have found unique ways to include them in their homes. We’re looking forward to seeing how this line grows in the upcoming year.
You can find more information about our La Ruche lighting line in this blog post and read about our experience at ADDS here.
If you’ve been following us for a while, you may have noticed we’ve had a new website since May. We decided to make the switch from Wix to WordPress to allow for more customization, better SEO and improved features (including a much nicer webstore). We’ve been really happy with the switch and have some website updates planned for the new year!
Read more about our new site and why having a website is important for artists in this blog post. Our website was built by Dorsay Creative.
We’ve also seen a ton of social media growth in the past year, especially on Instagram. If you don’t follow us (which you should!), we post daily videos showing various glassblowing processes. Each day a minute long clip goes up and we explain what is going on. Our goal with this is to share the magic of glassblowing to a wider audience and to educate them about the studio. These videos have gained quite a following and we’re at just under 80k followers! For comparison, Chihuly has 80.9k followers – so we’re doing pretty well. We’d love it if you’d follow us or share our Facebook and Instagram pages – we appreciate your support!
This past September we launched a Kickstarter campaign to help fund the upcoming expansion of our studio. This was a huge and exciting undertaking and we’re so appreciative of everyone that helped us reach our goal of $75k.
To those that don’t yet know, starting in April 2020, we will be adding on a second building to epiphany studios. This two story, 2,600 sq. ft. space will be used to build and house large-scale sculptures. April has quite a few large-scale pieces under her belt and wants to continue making them. Historically she has run into complications with the limitations of the current size of the studio or with renting out off-site spaces. This new building will combat problems we’ve had in the past and will also allow us to give back to the community. The expansion will not only be used for these large pieces, but as an event space that can hold up to 200 people.
We won’t go too into depth about this here, but you can read more about our Kickstarter campaign (and how you can run your own) in this blog post. Learn more about our upcoming expansion on our Kickstarter page.
At the beginning of October, April took a ten-day trip to China. Earlier in the year she was invited to take part of an artist residency and to make pieces for a building within a new complex they have built. While there, she proposed her ideas for artwork, traveled around experiencing the Chinese culture and enjoyed a lot of amazing food. It was an amazing adventure and we’re looking forward to sharing more about this trip and residency with you in the future!
This year April took part in the Clark Hulings Fund’s Art-Business Accelerator Program. This year-long program designed especially for visual artists, provides customized business training, network-building opportunities, publicity, and one-on-one support to boost the careers of the participants. At the end of year one, each Fellow will have established a viable business objective and developed an “investment-grade” business plan for an entrepreneurial project that furthers the objective. This program has provided invaluable experience for April and we are so proud of her for completing it.
A year-long course wasn’t enough for April though! She also enrolled in The Business of Leadership Course to learn aspects of leadership and how to run a successful business. At the left, you can see her receiving her certificate from this course. Congratulations on these achievements, April!
This year we’ve gotten a few new members!
If you’ve been to epiphany at the DSO, you may have met another new member of team epiphany. Gretchen Ruff has joined our team to help us out at our Midtown location. We’re so grateful for her help!
In the springtime, our amazing intern, Yaz, found an adorable stray kitten living by her house. April adopted the little grey kitten and now Devi is an important member of the studio. If you follow us on social media, you’re sure to see her pop up from time to time.
In September, Becca had an adorable baby boy. Elio can be seen at right dressed up as a cute little sloth hanging out with his underwater friends. He’s only visited the studio once, but we can see he has the potential to follow in his mom’s footsteps and become a glassblower!
After almost a decade with epiphany, our dedicated studio manager, Mary Griffin, has decided it’s time to move on to new adventures. Mary’s retirement is bittersweet as we’re sad to see her go but happy that she will have more time to do the things she enjoys including gardening and spending time with her grandchildren. (She has a new kitten too, so we know she’ll be busy!) Mary has been an invaluable member of our team and she will be greatly missed. Thank you for your time with epiphany and good luck with your retirement, Mary!
Throughout 2019 we had many amazing commissions from all across the country – even some overseas. We held our annual Spring Open Studios in May, our Seconds Sale in August and our Holiday Show the first weekend in December. Thank you to everyone who joined us for these events – we always enjoy having you in the studio. Now that we’re at the end of the year, we’re excited for everything that 2020 has to bring – which you’ll be able to read about in our next blog post. Keep an eye out!
In the meantime, you can keep up-to-date with us by signing up for our newsletter or following us on Facebook and Instagram.
Thanks again for another year of loyalty and support!
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