About George Walker and Michigan Craft Shows

My wife Renee is the one who indirectly brought me into the Arts & Crafts Business in the first place.   She is one of those people who has an Artistic gift in just about any media she tries.  She has made porcelain dolls, tole painted, made quilts, scrap booked, and a worked with a lot more creative media than the average ten people.   Just after we were first married, she asked me to cut wood for her so she could paint on it.    Eventually, we started entering shows part time in the fall to sell holiday items cut out of wood and painted.

Ever since I was a child, I loved being out in the woods, cutting down trees, and splitting firewood.  Even though living in Metropolitan Detroit I couldn't be out in the woods, it felt good to take a board and bring life to it by making a shape out of it.    The smell of sawdust and raw wood was a good sensation too.

Because of the talent of my wife to add the personal touch to her work, and the skill it required to make each piece look like a work of art, I have great respect for everyone out in the circuit.   It requires a special gift and a passion to put all the hours during the week to make their inventory.  Then many put it all on the line every weekend by going to a show across town, across the state, or across the country to offer their handmade items for sale.

In 1994, after losing my job because of corporate downsizing, I started publishing a book of Michigan craft shows.   When I started I had no idea of how many related events there were.  In almost every town large and small, every month of the year, there are shows to go to.   Starting in February of 1994, for the last fifteen plus years, I have traveled from one end of the state to the other.  A few years ago, I could claim I covered all the  events in Michigan from Hell to Paradise.  The Hell show went down in flames.  However, on the average I still attend about 200-250 shows a year.  I am out there every weekend, talking to vendors and finding out the good the bad and ugly. 

When I started, the world wide web was not out there that much in the business.  That has changed big time.  Almost everyone in the Arts and Crafts business currently has an e-mail address.   There are many vendors who have websites to offer their products to the world.    As the old Bob Dylan song goes, "The times they are a changin'."

After ten years, I publish the most complete book of Michigan event listings there is.   With pride I present information from the leading trade publication, The Michigan Crafter Magazine.   Whether you are someone who loves Arts and Crafts of all kinds and shops at the shows, or you are a vendor who needs to know where there is a show to apply to, The Michigan Crafter Magazine is the book for you.

Michigan Craft Shows and the Official Web Site

of Michigan's Arts and Crafts Business - michigancraftshows.com