October 29, 2016
TIDE
Maker Spotlight + Giveaway
TIDE Shop is an East London-based collective by artists Anna Beam, Laura Gee, and Laurie Maun, collaborating to create functional and decorative interior pieces. With a shared love for abstract art, they create paintings, ceramics, textile pieces, art prints and stationery, resulting in a bright, beautiful collection for your home.
To kick off the holiday season we’re hosting a giveaway! To enter, follow Tide Shop on Instagram and tag a friend in our giveaway post. The winner will be chosen on Monday, October 31st!
Where did your business name come from? Is there an interesting story behind it?
When we were discussing what to call this new collaborative project, we were talking a lot about how we’ve been linked together in one way or another for so many years now – through friends or other collaborations and projects. We come together and move apart to do our own thing, all very fluid. ‘Tide’ seemed the perfect name to tie the 3 of us together, it links the hand made nature of all our work and also there is a poetic momentum to the name, as soon as we suggested it it just felt right. And The Tide is High is a great song! We may or may not have been listening to Blondie at the time ;-)
photo by charlie mckay
What do you think sets your designs apart from others?
The majority of what we create are one off unique items, created in a slow hand made process, with influences taken from both art and design.We want Tide to be a platform for us to explore ways to combine these different disciplines. We’re interested in seeing how we can combine and blur the lines between art, craft and functional objects. We want to play around with the idea of treating functional objects as sculptures on a domestic scale, or conversely how a painting traditionally on canvas can be inspiration for the design of products for the body and interior spaces.
Why did you start working in this particular craft?
Laurie and Anna come from backgrounds in textiles and Laura from illustration. Though for the most part we’re all still connected to those fields, we’ve also always been interested in exploring other techniques and applications for our work.
What made you take this leap into being your own boss?
To be honest, ask any of us and we’d say that we’ve never had any intention of working for someone else! But none the less, continuing to work for ourselves even when there’s a strong temptation for more secure, regulated work can still make this choice feel like a leap. We’re all quite idealistic in terms of what we want to spend our days doing and what we want to achieve for ourselves.
How does the city you live in influence your work?
London is an incredible city because of its history and well known galleries, but also because of the incredibly proactive and inspiring community that we’re part of. We all live and work in East London, which has a vibrant mix of different cultures and a great community of artists and makers. The community we are part of in London of creatives and like minded people is wonderful, and to be able to share events like Renegade together, further cements these ties.
What are some inspirations for your work?
We are all inspired by slow hand made processes. Using our hands is very important for us whether it be sculpting clay, sewing, painting, drawing, there is an intimacy and transparency with hand made pieces. We all work in an intuitive way and share a love of abstract art; forms, colour and composition play a huge part in our work, each element adding to our individual visual language. The choice of colours, form and layering can evoke a mood, a feeling a connection, which we then translate into products for the home.
What are some tips or suggestions you’d like to offer to fellow makers?
We live in age where we are bombarded by images, information, tips and how to guides, and these are great for learning strategies and different approaches to work. However at the same time the most important thing is to actually do the work that speaks to you, to follow what ever inspires you and to keep practicing it. It can be easy to be swayed by other’s voices and aesthetics but the real joy comes when you create something that you love and feel energised by and then are willing to share it with others. Hard work and being kind to yourself and others is very important for a healthy creative life.
++ GIVEAWAY++
print by Laurie Maun, a colour study by Laura Gee and a vase by Anna Beam