About Great Handmade Gifts
In wake of 9-11, I needed something useful to do with my hands. The experienced worried me so, and left me feeling so useless and helpless, I began making crystal jewelry, wine rings, hand-rolled beeswax candles, and selling them when the creations took over the den.
Soon after, I saw the experience as an opportunity to “carpe diem,” and decided to form a company that sold not only my crafts, but those of other national artists, as well.
In November 2001, I incorporated Great Handmade Gifts, Inc., and in 2003 launched online e-commerce website featuring work of dozens of artists based in cities and towns across the U.S.
The company’s motto: “You are unique. Your gifts should be, too.”
I chose that as our slogan because, increasingly, I saw more women my age conforming to what they thought was the ‘right thing to do,’ but it seemed that mostly it was based on other people’s versions of what was right. In effort to push back against conformity, I wanted Great Handmade Gifts to represent artists and products who saw the world in a unique way—and created gifts and goodies that inspired others to feel the same.
I now represents more than 50 other artists who create everything from wall-sized murals (Sally Wern Comport) and illustration (Michael Gibbs) to photograhy (Steve Barrett), beaded sterling utensils (Melanie Barry) and handpainted furniture (Nicki Shishakly).
Washington Woman magazine assigned me to write a cover story about starting her company, which ran in December 2002; and in 2005, Modern Bride reporter Ann Cochran wrote an article about the great wedding favors available on the GHG website. Both are shown on this page.
To learn more about Great Handmade Gifts, visit www.www.greathandmadegifts.com.
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