{Featured Artist: Middleburg}

Here at Gussy has a lot to say we love to look at all things beautiful. Beautiful home decorations, beautifully colors, beautiful stories about family life.

Today marks week #15 of my series on featured Etsy artists. I hope you’ve enjoyed the featured drool-worthy eye-candy shops. Don’t worry, there’s many more :) You can read all back Featured Artist posts by clicking here.

Please join me in welcoming Susan at Middleburg

What inspires you? So many things: at a conversation at dinner with family and friends, I have been known to whip out a mini sketch book to capture a thought. Also walking through a really great antique show has sparked some great ideas. I love to look at the way things were constructed. I have a thing for old pin cushions, the ones with all the needles and pins still in them, like someone stopped sewing yesterday. Little vintage make-do things. Nature is a huge one, being in the garden or looking at flowers. I’m consistently absorbing information, color, texture, then churning it up in my head for days, weeks, months or even years. I never understand when someone says they are having a creative block, I have enough ideas to keep me and a small army busy for the next 20 years.

Where do you call home? Are you from there originally? Home will always be Chicago! So much of my life was there. Just having a fling with a historic house here in North Carolina right now. It’s something I’ve always wanted to do.

Name something unique to where you live. I’m so new to North Carolina, anything I think is unique is probably old hand around here. But I will agree with a stereo type of the south, they eat way too much fried food in my area, a good salad is hard to find or for that matter, a good cooked breakfast.

Share an interesting fact about yourself. OK how’s this, I once fitted Oprah for a bra… really! When I was in college, I worked at a lingerie shop on Rush Street in Chicago. One day Oprah Winfrey came in with her assistant in tow and they were shopping for a bra for her to wear under her gown that she would be wearing at the Academy Awards ceremony for her role in The Color Purple. And would you believe I forgot to have her sign the credit card slip, my boss made me call her and the assistant had to come back, how 80’s. {tee he he}

How did you come up with your shop name? Middleburg is just a portion of my studio’s name. But the name came about because I lived in Middleburg, Virginia for about 13 months. My husband was working in D.C. and we choose to live out in the country, a crazy idea if anybody knows that part of Northern Virginia. But I loved it, it was the most beautiful place I have ever lived, everything looked like a picture post card. So when I named my little studio I wanted everything to feel like I did when I was in Virginia. To me Middleburg meant, a little history, a quaint place, charming to be around, not perfect, kinda quirky all rolled up in beauty.

Share a little bit about yourself. I can be a real work-a-holic, and think everyone around me should be, too. But I’m trying to keep more balance in life.

If you had to describe yourself in a word, what would that word be? Tenacious – as a Jack Russell terrier, I’ll never give up on something I believe in.

What made you decide to open up shop? It really was a news report that I watched with Katie Couric. She talked about this phenomenal website called Etsy and how handmade was really coming into it’s own again. I’m so happy I listened, feel like I got in a little ahead of the wave. It gave me a chance to grow at a good pace.

Name your favorite thing about selling handmade. Making everything for real people, one at a time, from what can be bought at a really good hardware store.

Do you have a day job or sell on Etsy full-time? I took the plunge early on before I joined Etsy, about 6 months before. I had quit my position as a creative director and pretty much decided I was going to make this work or go scrub floors. Like I said, thank God for Etsy.

Give us a little glimpse into what a typical day in your life looks like. It sounds like so many other sellers. Usually by 7:30 am I’m sipping hot tea, in my pj’s, I’m on the computer printing out orders, answering convo’s, e-mails and keeping everything on the computer end rolling. Then a quick shower and back to the studio, looking at what has to go out that day. Then papier mache is usually pressed in the morning so it can bake all day. Lots of painting and details then.

A mid-day computer check and back to orders after a bite to eat. The afternoon seems to fly, we have only one post office that is convenient now and it closes a 5 pm right on the dot. So it is a race to see what will be finished, packed and dropped before the post lady slams the door.

See, I’m spoiled, my last post offices (in Illinois) would stay open until 6 pm and I had a post lady who would even order supplies for me and she would always have extra plain boxes for the international orders. She was the kind of the post office lady you wanted to clone.

But back to the day, I usually will stop about 6:30 and check the internet one more time before bed. Some nights I will come back after dinner and work a couple more hours during the busy times.

Share with us a favorite Etsy purchase or shop? There are so many on my 56 pages of favorites to-date, but here is a goodie — Poodlebreath. I love her rabbits, horses, foxes and well, the animals, check her out.

List a few of your most favorite pastimes? I decided when I moved I was going to have a normal life again, I was going to garden, ride my bike, go on walks, plus redo this old house I bought. Happy to say most of it is coming true. Just planted one part of the garden, my lettuces and spinach patch. Have joined the local tennis and health club and painted a good portion of the inside of the house. So life is little more balanced.

Read any good books lately? I’m reading everything I can get my hand on about SEO (search engine optimization). My bedside table lamp is being used elsewhere right now so that’s putting a cramp on reading, but I usually have a couple going at a time.

What is your most prized possession? I once said to someone, “There is nothing in my house that is so precious that it can’t be repurposed, rearranged, repainted or recycled. She gasped. I have a lot of things i love, but with age have realized I would be fine with out any of them, too.

What are three of your favorite foods? Chocolate, mayonnaise, and Champagne. But if you mean cuisine, I absolutely love Thai, really good Italian and French. Oh, and mashed potatoes any day or everyday!

What would you like to learn to do? I have always want to try Skeet Shooting. Strange I know, I hate guns.

What are you listening to right now? I’m not a great music person, but a habit I could not break is listening to Chicago radio in the studio, I stream WXRT (www.93xrt.com) all day. It makes me feel at home, and thinking I’m an hour earlier than I really am. So by day I live on Chicago time. A few of our favorite studio artists include Beck, Cold Play, Dave Matthews, Spoon, and Fleet Foxes.

{L: Hydrangea, R: Poppy}

{L: Rose, R: Dogwood}

{L: daisy, R: Coneflower}

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