The Indie Craft Show Directory

My craft show displays, like so many others’, are in a constant state of flux. I’m constantly adding new products to my line, and for some reason I don’t usually think about how to display them until right before a show. This month I had back to back weekend shows, Squidfire and the Brooklyn Lyceum, so I scrambled to put together some new displays for my new line of pendants and my older line of belt buckles whose display I wasn’t totally happy with. I had about a week to get it all together.

Belt Buckle Display

The belt buckle display is made of PVC and wood, and the cost of all the materials was about $20. The goal for the display was to put many of the buckles at eye level and keep the belts themselves from getting tangled up. Bonus points for being able to easily see the backs of the belts to view sizing info.

Parts list:

• 18″ long piece of 1×6
• 2 metal flanges for 3/4″ pipe
• 4 6″ lengths of 3/4″ PVC pipe
• 2 16″ lengths of 3/4″ PVC pipe
• 6 3/4″ PVC straight couplings
• 2 couplings to fit the 3/4″ pipe into the flange threads
• 3 16″ strips of rectangular molding
• Scraps of 1/8″ plywood
• 18 magnets
• C clamp to keep it from falling over

To make the rails to hold the buckles/belts, I took the rectangular molding and glued magnets evenly along them, 6 per rail. The buckle backs are steel, so they stick to the magnets pretty well. I used some ceramic magnets and some neodymium magnets because that’s what I had lying around, but if I were to do it again I’d probably use all neodymium.

To attach the rails to the PVC I laser cut some rings (shown on the left) out of some scrap 1/8 plywood and glue them to each end of the rails. While I’m lucky enough to have a laser, it’s something you could pretty easily cut by hand with a little patience and an appropriately sized drill bit.

The rings slip over the PVC, and rest on top of the coupling. The whole thing is surprisingly sturdy, and breaks down easily to fit in my Big Box of Craft Show Gear. The C clamp helps keep things stable. The last show I did had super wobbly floors that shook the table any time someone walked by.

Eventually I’d like to make some cloth covers for the PVC pipe, so it’s not so ugly, but for the time being the display worked pretty well. I sold a good deal more belt buckles than usual, and I think having them all easy to see was a big part of that.

Pendant Display

The pendant display was made literally the night before the show. I grabbed an Ikea frame and a 12″ square piece of grey industrial felt I had lying around. I cut the felt to fit the frame, and had some leftover. From that I cut narrow 1/4″ strips of felt the same width as the frame. I glued them at pendant-sized intervals, and the pendants are just thin enough that they can sit on the felt rails. And unlike my last slapdash jewelry display, this one doesn’t have nails sticking out the back to stab me.

Overall I’m pretty happy with the two displays, although I sometimes wonder what craft shows would look like if it wasn’t for Ikea. The Tinysaurs themselves are in need of some new display furniture, so I’ll probably put something together for them in the spring. I’m free from craft shows for a whole four months!

Tags: craft show, everything tiny