less than stellar week.  would like to escape to wherever the hell this place is:

all images from yosigo!!!’s flickr page found here.

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 I am a francophile.  Those who know me well can attest to this and I would venture to guess that even those who do not actually know me but have been in my store would not see fault with this statement.   My heritage is French…perhaps that is the genesis of my francophilia (oooh, i don’t know if that word works here, it sounds far to creepy to be applicable to anything having to do with lovely France!).  

I took French all through high school, My first French teacher, Miss.Foley, who acted far too zany to have us believe that it was JUST coffee in that mug of hers, would depress her index finger to one nostril and say “nasal….bon…..nasal…..bon….nasal…” in an attempt to convey proper pronunciation.  Then there was one of my French teachers at Kent, it was her first overseas teaching position, she appeared to be more of a peer than an elder and in her native tongue waxed on about her childhoods in Bordeaux…her unhappiness with being in Ohio was palpable. (but relatively speaking, even i could not blame her).

Upon my return to Cleveland 5 (maybe it was 6, i don’t even remember) years ago, I hired a French tutor, Bridgette, to tutor me one-on-one twice a week.  Bridgette was working on her Masters in French and we had a really great system going, where on Tuesdays I would meet at her house for an hour and we would work on several different types of lessons, from reading and interpretation, to pronunciations, to vocab lessons.  On Thursdays however, we would meet at the wine bar in Ohio city and upon entering the bar, English was no longer allowed, she would absolutely ignore any of my attempts to just sneak in one or two little questions or comments in English…if it was not spoken it French it may as well have not been spoken at all. This left the conversations to be quite simple but I appreciated the exercise very much.

Bridgette left after 6 months for California, from where I had just returned and with that came the end of my lessons.  I admittedly do not have a great retention rate for a foreign language, that is if it never gets put to use…  

I had, while financially constrained in my first year living in LA, adopted a system of virtual travel, realistic travel not being in the budget at the time, I would rent travel dvd’s and turn off the phone and computer and everything else and cozy up to a TV and travel through France with Rick Steve’s or take a train ride through Europe…i am nerd, i know.

So with all this Love for France, what makes me such a lousy Francophile you ask? Because I have NOT been there…save for in my dreams.  I certainly could have at some point or other have prioritized my disposable income to go,  fulfilling a life long dream…but I haven’t.  I don’t know why.  I really just don’t know why.

With opening a store this year, it is even harder to imagine getting away for too long any time soon, and i have no intention of making my first trip there a long weekend, no, its going to have to be a bit longer than that…so my goal at this point is to go in 2010.

until then…I will continue to travel there vicariously through the travels and blogs of others, like this AMAZING blogger’s recent trip there…Pia Jane Bijkerk’s blog is already a favorite, but her entries of Paris strike a special chord with me, especially her SOUNDSCAPES, remarkably moving…be sure to check these out by clicking here…until then, à bientôt!

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So the first ever MADE IN THE 216 was kinda awesome!  The turnout was 3 times what i dreamed it could be, the weather was behaving, the food was outstanding, and the artists/designers stuff looked incredible in the store!  I have been trying to imagine everyone’s items in the space since March but intensely for a month, which is when i started working on the floor plan based on lists the designers gave me of what they would be selling… BUT even though i had envisioned it for countless hours both while awake and during slumber, i had not in my wildest dreams envisioned it to look quite as lovely as it did….and i can say this with some level of modesty because intentionally for the event, i dwindled down Room Service’s own stock levels to make room for the most possible Cleveland made designs, so it is essentially everyone else’s talents i am commending…. 

The event took much longer than that month to plan, but there is a learning curve to each new project one undertakes and this was no exception.  I have decided to keep the artist/designers work up at the store for sale thru July 20, so if you did not get a chance to come by last week, there is still some time….

The above pics were taken at Saturday’s MADE IN THE 216 event, which was again an incredible turnout, but I don’t think i could have even fit a camera into the crowd to take a pic Friday night!!!  in fact channel 3 & 5 news even came out!  Check it out here: http://www.wkyc.com/video/default.aspx?mid=775343023 and be sure to look out for 2 of the ‘216’s participating artists: sara & april as well as my parents, aunt and grandma and apparently Tim’s hairdresser and his partner and really, i bet lots of people we know are in it, but honestly i only gave it a quick viewing!

I hope you had or will have a chance to stop by and check out some of the goods being made right here in CLEVELAND.  The genesis of this event was my desire to see Clevelanders stop comparing ourselves to places like NY and Chicago, yes, they are awe-inspiring places and all that, i like visiting them both very much, But we are not that scale of city, so to compare ourselves to places like that is futile and only promotes a collective poor self-esteem, which in my opinion is one of the city’s biggest issues. So in an attempt to highlight all the cool stuff being designed and made right here I created this show, which will feature a rotating roster of artists/designers each show….always looking to highlight a wide weft of types of products from apparel to housewares and linens to jewelry and everything in between…

THANKS AGAIN TO ALL THAT CAME OUT TO SUPPORT A LOCAL BUSINESS AND LOCAL ARTISTS/DESIGNERS…WE ALL APPRECIATED IT SO MUCH AND IT WAS SOOOOO MUCH FUN!  If you would like to learn more about the participating designers/artists, below you will find links to any websites/stores that they have:

small screen desings

little korboose

bctz 

satomi jin

buzz buzz desings

marian made

hannah verbeuren photography

finley handmade

[base] line

honey bee linens

sarah reidel

sharon hynes

if you or someone you know is a Cleveland-based designer and interested in applying to be a part of a future show (next one coming up in NOVEMBER in time for holiday shopping!!!) please send an email to:

info@roomservicecleveland.com and in the subject type in 216 and send me a brief description of what you make and your professional experience with it as well as 1-5 photos of your work.  I will not take any appointments without having first received an email submission.  PLEASE DO NOT COME INTO THE STORE WITH YOUR PORTFOLIOS WITHOUT AN APPOINTMENT.

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