local holiday shopping on the bayou: #designcraft market

photo by son of a sailor 

black friday sounded awful to me. which, is why I'm shopping the AIGA’s DesignCraft Market at market square park. the free, designer-driven market features designers from houston, austin and beyond, selling hand-crafted goods at the award-winning park nestled in downtown’s historic district.

shoppers can start the day with breakfast pitas and lattes from niko niko’s, or just hit the ground running with a pint of saint arnold brew. more than just a market, there will be printing demonstrations from houston’s workhorse prints, live music from young girls (i've seen them before, they are awesome!), poor pilate (another great houston band, and cool friends with cool girlfriends) and grandfather child and plenty of sparkly trinkets to ohh and ahh over.

here’s just a few shops i'm excited check out:

evens – the brainchild of the lovely kate de para, a great girl whom i've had to pleasure to see every now and then. she's a textile designer who just made her way back to Texas after studying at SCAD. evens offers silk textiles for men and women, digitally dyed in the united states and hand-sewn by ms. de para herself.

son of a sailor – a sweet jewelry collaboration with a nautical twist, from husband and wife team jessica tata and william knopp of austin. their brassy treasures necklaces and pastel leather bracelets have been featured on designsponge, NYLON, SF girl by bay, daily candy and more.

bonsai terrariums – the names says it all, but vernon caldera’s luxe terrariums are something to be seen. His artfully-designed succulent wonderlands have been showcased at BHLDN, lawndale art center and in lonny and luxe interiors + design magazines.

CVela Design – christopher vela’s designs span across every medium out there – motion graphics, print, web and beyond. shoppers wear his playful print on their sleeves, by snatching up some of his screen-print tees.

.. and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.  for more information and a full list of vendors, click here.

AIGA designcraft market

 saturday, december 1, 2012

10 am – 6 pm

market square park

301 milam, houston texas

77002

street parking is free on saturdays and $5 parking is available at the market square Garage. market square park is located one block north of the preston METRORail station.

note: a version of this article was published on the plugged in blog for downtown houston.