“What to take when leaving the house in the time of Covid” //or// “how to pack your Madrona Hipster”
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6.5” x 9” tall body w zip
6.5” x 7” tall front pocket
55” strap
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Fits: phone, $$, mask, hand sanitizer, keys, sunglasses, doggie bags - Perfect for your walk.
A year ago I took a “grow your business” class @businessimpactnw. I met these amazing women and we stay friends, and supporters of eachother. The class taught me skills, but mostly gave me confidence. The class grew my business and my women friends. It’s what we do as women. Support each other. Duh.
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I made this colorful photo black & white in honor of the #challengeaccepted challenge, which originated to support women in Turkey. I support women all over the world to have confidence and use our own superpowers to share with the world. I have hired and supported women in my business from Iran, Indonesia, Cambodia, Vietnam, Korea, China, Laos, Peru, India, Switzerland, USA. I’m proud to offer jobs here in Seattle supporting other women. We all came from somewhere else. What’s your superpower?
I got on the band wagon! Helping hospitals with masks. Calling these: “Keep your Germs to Yourself” masks. These aren’t medical grade protection. Just 2 layers of cotton, whatever you’ve got. (We sell cotton online too - 58” wide. These are for patients or any of us to to keep our germs from spreading. You can make your own! See my stories for a video. Swipe right for a simple pattern. Take care of eachother out there. PLEASE stay 6ft away. Or I’ll have to make hoop skirts next! .
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My stitchers need work as many manufacturers cancel orders as stores shut down. We will make 250 of these for hospitals next week. We will pay our sewers and donate them, duh. Ready to make thousands as needed. Comments? Ideas? Contacts? Thank you!
Ok. “Keep your germs to yourself!” Here is a pattern to make your own masks for friends, neighbors & those who have to go to drs or hospitals. We are making 500 of these to start. Bias tape donated ✔️Cutting donated ✔️stitchers back to work ✔️please send along where to donate, or sell at cost for sewing only. (We’d like to help our work-from-home stitchers stay employed thru this time.) Should we sell these masks too?
I love all the fabric orders coming in. Scroll right to see 2 different personalities from 2 orders shipped today. Thank you. We now have kitties in 2 colors on the website! Find the fabric tab to order. These are laminated - easy to wipe off with any kind of cleaner or sanitizer you are using now. And washable. Timely. .
We also sell 100% cotton, 59” wide. That’s enough to make a lot of face masks. Stay tuned, a video class (3 min) for making face masks will be posted in stories tomorrow.
Now that I’m obsessed with mask making, I so love this photo from the 1918 flu era posted by @johnrwells Tomorrow we pick up & donate 200 with of the 500 masks we made to the Pierce County Police Dept. (can’t wait to see them in some of our prints) thanks to @refugeesarts We are hoping to give some to the Boys & Girls club for the staff, kids & families using their services. A retirement home and some grocery clerks have requested them. We offer a free mask with every online purchase. We are in this together and between my favorite yoga studios posting online videos, and checking in with friends & family I haven’t seen for a while, we are staying connected in new ways. I feel you. The act of mask making is an act of courage and bravery. We can stop this together. We all must do our part. Thank you.
We haven’t killed eachother ... yet. .
Is it the weekend yet? Or is it Tuesday? .
We’ve gotten these masks made. Lots of em. We are donating 200 to Pierce county
Cops. (How will they like sock monkeys?)And 750 to Boys & Girls Cubs of King Co. For kids & their families and staff still entertaining & feeding kids all day. .
We’ve teamed up with @refugeesarts their gofundme campaign will help pay our stitchers to make these. Please check our #linkinbio .
Please support our efforts and reach out with needs. Also, free mask with every order on our website. We’ll sell them on there soon too. Stay safe out there!
What a dork. Today we walked (how we roll) between rain dumps down to the Boys & Girls Club @clubinsider to drop off 300 donated face masks. ( our Denny tote I’m wearing holds 250 masks. Just getting started, people. More requests coming in. Another today from Neighborcare Clinics, serving homeless folks. We are all in this together and the more we can help eachother the better. We donate the fabric, duh, because they are awesome! We now have masks for sale in packs of 5 on our website. Proceeds go to fund this project. And did you notice my coolest umbrella ever? Thanks
Using our 100% cotton napkin fabric, we have pivoted to mask making. Our sewers already work safely from home. They are keeping their jobs. We have the fabric and are meeting a need. We’re donating washable cotton masks to kids & workers in childcare, elder care, grocery stores, clinics serving homeless... .
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#wecandoit #makemasks .
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/31/well/live/coronavirus-N95-mask-DIY-face-mask-health.html
"But more experts now say that wearing a nonmedical or homemade mask to go the grocery store or pharmacy may be a good idea."
Dr. Soe-Lin said she believes an added benefit of a mask is that it serves as a constant reminder against touching your face, a major way that the virus is spread. But no face covering, whether it’s homemade or a medical mask, makes you invincible. Pulling a mask on and off or fidgeting with it will lessen its effectiveness. And in theory, fiddling with your mask could contaminate it. Always remove a mask by the ear loops or the tie — never the part that covers your face. Dr. Soe-Lin said she has used cloth masks for three weeks and washes and dries them regularly. Someone with only one mask can hand wash at night and let it air dry. If a mask gets wet or damp while you are wearing it, it’s less effective, she said.
I had never made or thought of a mask 2 weeks ago. Now we have produced, sold and donated over 2,000 and the #s are growing exponentially. We have pivoted our business to meet this need, and keep our sewers employed in a time when other work has evaporated for them. We had a stockpile of napkin, uncoated fabrics in all our fun patterns which is perfect for the masks we now all must wear. Why not have a fun one?
As order volumes increase, our shipping department has decreased. My fabulous assistant, Loie, is working from home and not shipping orders or putting everything away as before. My husband David is working by my side until midnight getting orders packed and shipped. If we make a mistake, let us know and we are happy to bend over backwards to make it right.
We have gone from a manageable but bustling wholesale business with reps and stores, and 6-10 retail orders coming in on our website each day to 200-250 retail orders per day. We used to make pretty laminated products for your home and going out in the world to now producing 100% cotton potentially life saving face masks. It's exciting and exhausting.
It's what I do. I'm all in on every project. It's how I'll get thru this. It's what I can offer. I'm obsessed with finding the needs for our donations and make them happen. In my next email I'll share the charts my husband has been keeping, but here's my version:
We put them on the website 5 days ago.
# of masks sold:
April 1 - 380
April 2 - 692
April 3 - 1519
April 4 - 1669
# of masks donated
1440 - we have work to do.
Right now, demand exceeds capacity. This will change next week as more sewers are making them.
These sewers work in their homes, and can keep working thru the work bans. We put the masks in the dryer for 30+ min on high before we touch & pack them. We have been quarantined for 2+ weeks.
What will tomorrow bring?
Our stitchers have gone thru our donated binding for ties, all the rest of the aprons strings we had on hand, and now we are making our own bias tape out of our printed cottons and the possibility of the combos make me squeal with excitement. Why not make these fun?
Which brings us to the topic of print availability. You can ask us for what you want, but we may just ship what we have. in the end, something is better than nothing and we are doing the best we can. You can rock it!
We are finding our new rhythm.
We are making and shipping masks as fast as we can. Next week, we will be able to make 1000+ masks per day. We have shipped ~1200 so far, just picked up 900. We ship them out as fast as we can get more masks, and need to keep supplying donations as well.
NOTE: We are printing your orders and shipping label the day we get orders. This doesn't mean orders have shipped yet. You can check your tracking to find out where it is. Current orders will go out Mon/Tues delivering in 1-3 days via USPS.
Many of you locals want to come pick up. We are going to arrange a pick up area in our porch / front yard. Please do not linger. Call or email if you need something. We are here for you.
We love all of you and will have a big hug fest once this is all over. Hang in there!
While we were at the Quilt Market in Kansas City last week, one of our customers told us to go to Pryde's, a kitchen store with the biggest selection of Fiestaware in the midwest. We had gotten Fiestaware when we got married 32 years ago. We love it but never thought of selling our colorful splashy modern laminated cotton tablecloths, aprons & napkins alongside it. 
Well, David, our family's fabulous cook, and my cute husband, packed a bag of samples and walked into the cooking mecca of Pryde's. There, he met Louise, a fellow "Food is Love" guide & owner of the most inspirational kitchen store. 
The employees and Louise all loved IMPWEARhome. They embraced our line and Louise made the largest wholesale order we've ever gotten in mere minutes. 
This is Louise in her historic store.
David's excitement when he returned to the booth (where I had spent the afternoon happily connecting with my fellow fabric lover people) was palpable. He had connected with these cooks who love color and abundance as much as we do.
