Three minutes.
That’s how long it took Celina Frisson, otherwise known as @thecreativetraveller, to sell out her latest stock of hand-painted ceramic mugs.
On December 5 at 3 p.m., Frisson opened her online shop. By 3:03 p.m., 50 or so pieces of pottery had been scooped up.
Frisson, a painter and graphic designer by trade, is hitting a particularly sweet spot of artistic and entrepreneurial appeal. Her pottery—mostly mugs, but also planters, vases and lamps—combines a modern, environment-inspired process with a 20,000-year-old medium. And just like the Eurasian hut dwellers of the Neolithic period simply had to have the latest vessels to adorn their earthenware furniture (probably), for today’s denizens of social media, Frisson’s pottery is absolutely popping off.
“People don’t want to buy things from Amazon,” the Langley, B.C. native said recently. “They want something hand-built, hand-formed.”
Frisson wasn’t always hand-throwing the internet’s most sought-after swag. Before becoming a designer, she was a contract-based painter, having gone to art school on a scholarship and getting work through commissions. But those gigs, while instructive, didn’t allow her to develop her own style, she said. Then she discovered pottery.
“I thought ‘this is something I can have.’”
Like a novice potter’s lathe, Frisson’s life was spinning pretty fast at that point. She had recently fallen in love with Jasper National Park after being enamoured by the scenery around Talbot Lake. When she saw Tourism Jasper was hiring, she took it as a sign.
“It might sound cliché but it truly felt like fate,” she said.
She got the job.
Having landed on her feet, Frisson soon found a space at Jasper Habitat for the Arts where she could now use her hands. Pottery seemed to scratch the creative itch she was feeling.
“I needed a balance between screen time and working with something tactile,” she said.
She didn’t take a single class, instead turning to the world’s most universal teacher: YouTube.
“Typical millennial,” she laughed.
As her forms got better, she was soon applying her designer-trained eye for perspective, composition and colour schemes. Incorporating her painterly skills was only natural, and eventually she had an entire cafeteria’s worth of funky and functional mountain-inspired mugs.
“I like the idea of amalgamating something rustic and modern,” she said.
So do her 7,000 Instagram followers, apparently. Frisson has keyed into the successful tactics of social media stars around the world: she’s consistent, her brand is front and centre, she engages her audience and she responds to feedback. Her online presence seems effortless, but make no mistake, it’s a lot of work.
“You’ve got to set your own goals,” she said. “A lot goes on behind the scenes.”
But if one is strategic, digital marketing can open doors.
“Instagram is very much the pretty part of operating a business,” she says. “But it’s also very powerful in how you can reach a lot of people quite quickly.”
Indeed The Creative Traveller’s ceramics are well-travelled. Along with her Canadian fans, Frisson now has customers in India, Australia and the U.S.. When asked to reflect on her rapid journey from hobby potter to selling out her stock with each pop-up sale or online shop update, she could only shake her head in disbelief.
“It’s crazy,” she said.
But the online affection is not a one-way street. To give back to the local artisan community, Frisson and a colleague have started an online art directory, MountainMakers. Through the platform, MountainMakers is helping promote other creative minds, celebrating what they call “slow culture,” and giving Jasperites plenty of reasons to shop local.
“Pause to appreciate life’s little riches,” the website suggests.
But don’t pause too long. If you do, you might miss The Creative Traveller’s next online pottery release.
Bob Covey// thejasperlocal@gmail.com
