Etsy Canada - belated review

Hi everyone!
It has been a while since my last post and I hope you all had a great time. I was super busy with Kirameku and as some of you have seen on my Facebook page, I'm currently working on another exciting project. I can't tell much more than that for now. But what I can tell you is my experience at the first Montreal Etsy Made in Canada craft show! :)

There was gorgeous weather on that Saturday and we happily head down to the shop Angus, me, my boyfriend and my Mom (who is also an Etsy artisan). Once at destination, we looked for the entrance with a bit of difficulty but then we were greeted by big orange and white pompoms and an Etsy banner inside the shop Angus. Ouf, we managed to find the place! We were surprised to see there was no list of artisans and the room was so huge we didn't know where to start. Here, let me show you the beautiful space the vendors had.

The wonderful shop Angus and Etsy Made in Canada!

The cute kiosque of Gredin! 

We got to the fair early in the afternoon, hoping to find some awesome Christmas gifts. Along the way we saw the wonderful Gredin and the whimsical Cara Carmina. There were a few other stores that I recognized from browsing on Etsy and we say some very cute stuff. In my favorite discoveries, there's Des Enfantillages which creations left me sad not to have any babies in the family to offer them to! Her toys are colorfuls, clever and both child and parent approved. I loved her soft version of a slingshot with small wool balls as projectiles. I mean, how cool is that? :)

We also came across Paper Circus which had lovely and sweet illustrations. A found her tag lines to be catchy and liked her soft, vintage color palette. My favourite was her ''A Balanced Diet is a Cookie In Each Hand'' illustration.

I also wanted to speak with the creator behind Rousskine, a lovely handmade plush boutique but her kiosque was packed the entire time we were there - which was no surprise to me, her dolls are soooo cute! I left her to her customers as her adorable creations were finding new homes. I was really tempted to buy one of her owl plush but, once again, no kids in the family.

That sums up pretty much the Etsy Montreal Show for me. I don't want to sound harsh, but within the 60 artisans, we didn't feel like we had a lot of choice. I'm not saying this in a bad way but simply that all three of us had hoped to find more variety within the style in the artists. A lot of artists had similar aesthetics that were too simple for our taste. They had lovely creations, don't get me wrong, and beautiful craftsmanship, simply it wasn't my style. So far, I was personally more impressed by the Puces Pop craft show then the Etsy made in Canada. That being said, Puces Pop was celebrating it's 10 years anniversary and it was the first show with the Etsy Made in Canada Montreal edition. The Shop Angus venue was really beautiful and we had enough space to browse around even when there was a lot of customers at an artisans table, wich was really nice. The lighting was natural and gave a really nice ambiance and the decorations added a little something cute and colourful. I was a good show but the three of us were expecting to stay a few hours browsing through the 60 artisans, but finished our tour in an hour.

I hope the artisans had a great time and I'm curious to see if Etsy will continue this amazing concept - I sure hope so, I love the idea of doing it all the same day through out Canada, so awesome! Next year I would sure love to go see the Toronto or Ottawa show, see how our neighbours are using their creativity  :)

On this everyone, I wish you all a great weekend and I'll be back soon with the October project countdown for Kirameku! Take care! :)
*M*