Above is a pic of blogger Joz and me. She’s trying to steal my bag. Anyway.

The shortage of progress report posts lately is due to the lack of actual progress. Instead, I’ve been dabbling these days. Oh, lots of dabbling. That’s what you do when you don’t know what to do. You dabble.

For one, I’ve been designing for another designer. That has been an amazing experience and loads of fun. His style and brand point of view is distinctly different and divergent from TZ’s, so we’re in no way competitors. You could describe his label as fashion-forward and highly conscious of current trends, lots of bells and whistles. His target buyer couldn’t be a bigger contrast from my target buyer, and that’s been an interesting exercise, to design for someone with tastes really quite different from mine.

(Not a bag I would carry myself.)

(I can show you these images because they are not actually being used.)

Production wise, I’ve also been dabbling. Pretty much everywhere except the PRC now. To China’s credit, the one positive point of manufacturing there (before) was how fast they were (when they wanted to be). We are currently working with several manufacturers, none of them in China, with one in particular very dearly close to home (cross fingers), and while I have enjoyed the service experiences so far, they’re a whole lot slooooower. I’m not complaining, just saying. If you want quality and personal attention, you’re going to have to wait for it. If you want fast turnaround and cheap prices, some things will have to give, and it’s usually quality and personal attention. Good to have learned firsthand this otherwise common-sense-ish lesson. So here is me saying to you, “After personally touching the blazing flame several times, I may now confidently confirm that the fire is indeed hot. Ouch.” And folks, now you know, in case you’re an idiot like me and hadn’t known this before, yes, the metaphorical fire is quite hot.

When I’m not designing (or in pursuit of any of the other dozen of my interests), I’m the managing editor of Kartika Review, a national APIA literary arts journal. We’re currently working on finalizing the 2011 anthology, which will be due out in print later this month.

Flyer design by Lac Su.

By the way if you’re in the San Diego area and interested in APIA literature, be sure to attend our anthology launch party and reading event January 27, Friday, 8:30 p.m. at the Thumbprint Art Gallery in La Jolla, CA. Check out the Facebook page for the event. It’s organized by the lovely Jennifer Derilo, one of Kartika‘s editors, and Lac Su (look him up if you’re not already familiar with his amazing work).

With regard to that other designer, I can’t wait to tell you all more once the details of our collaboration are solidified.

I am pissed as f*** over the purse hook polish wipe things I ordered, although what can I say, maybe it’s my own darn fault.

You can’t tell from any photos I’d take of the wipes, but every wipe has embossed into it “Zheng Cheng Long.” I haven’t a f****** clue what that means nor do I care. It shouldn’t be there.

You would think after my many traumatizing experiences dealing with Chinese factories I would have known better than to order my polish wipe things from China, but I mean these were just polish wipe things, what could possibly go wrong?

I even specifically e-mailed the manufacturer prior to order, inquiring whether the wipes were completely blank, void of any designs, decorations, embossings, logos, etc. I explained who I was and what I needed the wipes for and emphasized how important it was that there were no designs, decorations, embossings, or logos of any kind on the wipes.

I mean, it was a great discounted deal. That should have been the second red flag. You get what you pay for. Still! I wouldn’t have ever expected the seller to outright lie to me!

So I now have a giant stack of purse hook polish wipes that are otherwise of good sound quality, except every one of them has “Zheng Cheng Long” embossed on them. Holy moly @#$%^&*. I don’t know what I’m going to do with these things now. I’m so pissed. So pissed. If this entire transaction had occurred in the States, you better believe I’d be seeking legal recourse. But it’s in China and ultimately, it’s just not worth pursuing. All I can do is wallow in my own fury.

The seller even had the audacity to include a Christmas card (see photo above). Gah!

Well. *breath, breath, exhale* I’ll figure something out.

In other cheerier news, let’s announce our first giveaway winner!

I opted for Excel’s random number generator. Here were the entrants:

Hubby, my finance whiz, showed me how to do this:

And the winner is…

Number 6, Laura, a “geektastic girl attempting creative proctastination” (her words, not mine) of “The Blog of Worldly Delights.”

Laura, my dear, I will be contacting you privately soon. I wanted to package the TZ purse hooks with the polish wipes and the velveteen drawstring bags, but at this point, we’re going to have to discuss further. As you can clearly see in the first part of this post, we’re having problems. Gah~!

Anyway, thanks for playing, everybody!

In other news…

Greetings from Lake Tahoe. I have paws!

Purse Hook Polish Wipes Update: I’ve been trying to negotiate with the seller. The seller not only refuses to acknowledge any fault or misrepresentation, she assures me that the “Zheng Cheng Long” is pretty. Pretty! That’s what she said! The words are pretty and is part of the decoration and design. Some people are incredible! :: sooo pissed ::

I tried again to take photos to show you what I’m talking about with the “Zheng Cheng Long.” (Below to the left is the back view of one of the TZ clutch samples. To the right–the wretched, blasted purse hook polish wipe things.)

If I do crazy funky things with the image in Photoshop, you get the following contrast, which makes the “Zheng Cheng Long” a little more visible:

Un-effing-believable! And then to add a farcical Merry Christmas card like you have no foresight that I, the buyer, will be royally pissed off… and then after I do get royally pissed off, to tell me “Zheng Cheng Long” is part of the decoration and design and it’s pretty?!

Some people (or sellers in China) are born with no shame at all. Bah humbug. Christmas indeed.

I know I’ve been inactive on this blog for the past few months, and I feel bad about that. So to segue me back into activity here on this design diary, I’m holding a bloggers’ giveaway, just a small one. I’m giving away two Taryn Zhang purse hooks. (Click on that link for more info on these nifty little doodads.)

Why two? Well, dear, because it is the giving season now. One is for you, and one is for you to give away. =)

Whatcha gotta do? Here’s a summary:

Checklist:

[  ] You’re a blogger.

[  ] Leave a comment to this post.

[  ] Share link to this blog on FB or Twitter.

[  ] Follow this blog in your blog reader.

If you win and I’ve sent you the purse hooks:

[  ] Blog about this blog on your blog.

The winner will be selected at random about two weeks from now, on December 19.

That is basically all you need to know/do to enter. If you still have questions, though, more deets after the jump.

Now here are the guidelines in long form:

TO ENTER:

1. Bona Fide Blogger. You must be authoring a blog that to date has at least 5 entries. Hence the title “bloggers’ giveaway.” [And I reserve the right to refuse awarding you if, you know, your 5-entry-blog looks fake. This is for legit bloggers, my friends.] No, your blog does not need to be about handbags or fashion. Any kind of blog will do, so long as it’s a bona fide blog.
2. One Entry Per Blogger. Sorry, no, you cannot enter a gajillion times. Only once. One entry per blogger. If you author fifty blogs and enter fifty times, that’s cheating and while I’ll probably never find out, it’s gonna be on you. Let’s play fair. One blogger, one entry. If you host multiple blogs, you get to choose which one blog to enter under.
3. Comment. Leave a comment to this post so I know you’ve entered. I’ll be selecting the winner at random from the comments section. So if you don’t leave a comment, you can’t possibly win. Does that make sense? =P Also, be sure you leave in your comment an easy way for me to privately message you in the event you win.
4. Share Via Twitter or Facebook. Share through either your Twitter or Facebook account a link to TZ. You can link this blog directly, blog.tarynzhang.com, or the TZ website, tarynzhang.com.
5. Subscribe to this Blog. Subscribe to this blog with either Bloglovin’ or your blog reader of choice. For quick links, see the right hand side bar.

Alas, there are more guidelines… keep reading… I know. I’m horrible.

ACTIONS REQUIRED, POST-GIVEAWAY:

Once I’ve selected at random a winner for this giveaway, the winner agrees to do the following after he or she has received the purse hook:

1. Post a blog entry with some reference to Taryn Zhang. Whatever you want. I trust you. The focal point of the post does not have to be about TZ, by the way. I’m self-centered, but not that self-centered. After you receive the purse hook, post something on your blog about Taryn Zhang New York. You can do a whole post featuring TZ, any one aspect of TZ, the purse hook you just got, whatevs. Go nuts. Or you can simply reference it sweetly somewhere in the post and make it seem like TZ relates to whatever was the focal point of said post. Hey, I’ll take that too. Be sure to link me to your post once it’s up. =)
2. Give away that second purse hook. Give it to your mom, your best friend since preschool, your roommate, another fellow blogger, host a giveaway on your own blog, anyone at all who you care about. That’s the only condition: someone you care about. No, sorry. Make it two conditions: (1) someone you care about, and (2) someone who will actually put a purse hook to good use. Yeah. That second condition makes sense, right? Be sure to let me know who you gave away that second purse hook to and, to satiate my curiosity, also let me know why you chose that person.
3. Complete post-giveaway actions soon. I’m not going to stamp on here a set time frame or deadline. But get it done within reason. I would say a month is within reason. If you suddenly get slammed with work in your life, within a couple months is okay, too. You get it, right?

True, the post-giveaway part that is to happen after I’ve selected the winner and sent out the purse hooks is a leap of faith on my part, but one I’ll gladly take. I’ve had an amazing, positive experience via this design diary, so I’m in!

Okay. That’s all of it. Bloggers’ giveaway to close on December 19. Love you!

Was greeted with that note on my Facebook Wall this morning. Both redacted names are high school buddies. How insane — insane in, oh, such a very, very good way!

Also, in the last few weeks I’ve received an overwhelming amount of warmth, encouragement, and support. (And Christmas order requests. Again, so sorry, but we have no inventory to sell right now. See previous few posts on this blog for why.)

Thank you, all. =)

:: deep, long, drawn-out sigh ::

We have parted ways with our Hong Kong / China manufacturer. I’m.. hm, okay, how do we put this nicely in a PC way.. well, personally, I’m done with China. I’ll summarize my main criticisms of doing business in China in a future post, but for now, suffice it to say our sights are set elsewhere.

So we’ve been chatting with a couple of factories in various parts of Southeast Asia and South America. For some of these places, I had to look them up on a map. (No shame in acknowledging my ignorance here…) Hubby and I are checking over our 2012 vacation days to plan a couple trips to countries we’ve never been to and don’t speak the language. For us at least, the good part about doing business in China was we spoke the language (me, sorta; him, native fluency). Ah well, that was all in the past. It’s all looking forward now. So hold on tight for some world frolicking adventures.

Over the last year, I’ve revised the designs in the alpha collection multiple times. Some of the revisions were in the design details and were minor. 90 degrees to 85 degress. I remember this one. The factory responded with, “Really? 90 degrees to 85 degrees. Really?!?” =P

Others were serious revisions, after I received feedback from product testers. For instance, see above shoulder strap revision. Our shoulder straps will now come with an ergonomic shoulder pad. The pad is removable, so if you find it too hideous, you don’t have to use it. However, my more pragmatic friends griped to me about how their shoulders ached after lugging around a briefcase with a laptop inside for hours on end. I’m hoping the ergonomic shoulder pad will help some.

Since we were working with the same factory for the whole year, I didn’t need to rewrite full briefs for the changes; I just had to notify them of the desired adjustments after each samples production came back.

After a year’s progression of tweaking this, redoing that, the original design briefs I drew up are now so different from the final design I want that I have to draw up entirely new design briefs to send to the new factories. What a pain.

And because the world is not fair, all this has to fall on me the same month I couldn’t be busier at the day job. I’m neck-deep in some big cases right now and have had to deal with more litigation work than usual. (I’m a transactional attorney; this is a clarification that will make sense to some people and invite understanding nods of sympathy.) So in addition to all the day job stress, I now have TZ stress. Anyway, complaining over, I promise. Now on to the purpose of this post, the nutshell summary, design briefing part.

The purpose of this post is to provide a nutshell summary of what goes into submitting design briefs to a contract manufacturer, or at least how I do it. It’s certainly not the most efficient way, considering I don’t have any of the cool specialty design software programs. The way I do it is pretty old school and it’s not like I recommend it exactly, but if you’re an amateur starting with nothing, my old school process might be an option.

I’m too stingy to buy a legit sketchpad, so I use print paper, as in computer printer paper. With blank print paper and a black roller ball pen, I drew the final version that incorporates all the changes I’ve made in the last year.

An impressive drawing? No. Does it get my point across? Yes.

Typically if I were just sketching, I’d add a lot of shading, but I keep that to a bare minimum when doing these design sketches because they’ll be uploaded digitally for alteration. It’s hard to do the digital stuff to these sketches if there are too many pen lines, so the fewer the pen lines, the better.

Once I complete the pen and paper sketch, I scan it in and save it as a JPG file. I archive it so if I lose the hard copy original, I can still print out the JPG as backup.

Then on that same sketch sheet, I mark up the drawing with notes. All measurements (in centimeters, not inches, something I’ve had to work real hard at getting used to) are in red ink and all notes and descriptions in blue ink.

My supervisor, the kitty pictured above, totally micromanages me. He has to check and double-check everything I do. There he is looking over a sketch of the signature TZ handle bases.

I also draft style summary sheets, which serve as the cover page to each brief. These are done in MS Word. Above is a screen shot example of a style summary sheet. This page summarizes the dimensions, stitching instructions, hardware notes, etc.

For an illustration of what the styles will look like in the color options I’ve selected, I upload that pen ink drawing onto the computer and using a paint can function, digitally color in the pen ink drawings.

The above illustration is from a page of the briefs that illustrate the contrast stitching I want. If there are special stitching instructions for the style, I include it on this same page. For the Peripatetic weekender tote illustrated above, a more industrial needle than the standard ones used is required, so I make that notation here on this page.

That’s a screen shot of Jasc Paint Shop Pro, the software program I use for digital alterations of my sketches. It’s a fantastic program, and I prefer it over Photoshop. In Jasc, the paint can function is referred to as the “Flood Fill Tool,” I guess.

To cover my bases, I reviewed all the swatches I’ve collected from the many leather factories I’ve talked to. In the above photo, my feline supervisor is also reviewing the swatches with me.

Over the last two years, I’ve visited and chatted with dozens upon dozens of factories around the world that manufacture vegan (synthetic) leathers. We don’t look at any PVC at all. Ew, gross. Among polyurethanes (PUs), there’s a wide variety of manufacturing methods, embossing techniques, treatments, and therefore a wide range of quality.

“That one looks promising.”

We’re focused on the high end stuff, to put it simply. We’ve looked at soy-based polyurethanes, other vegetable-based materials, and the varying types could be listed on and on.

By this point, I’m settled into my choices already and we’re going with a totally customized material (so it’s not pictured in any of the color swatches above).

“Bird!”

And there goes the kitty’s attention. Birds flying around outside our window interest him more than leather swatches.

Anyway, I then compile sketches with the dimensions (in centimeters, in red ink), sketches with notes and descriptions (keep it concise, in blue ink), any special stitching or color pairing instructions, and the style summary sheet, which lists out the hardware, etc. That is all then organized into a PDF and sent off to the manufacturer. If I get back a workable quotation, we then move forward and I coordinate between the leather factory and the handbags factory. Then we’ll proceed with samples making and if that goes well, confirmation samples and if that goes well, a production order is finalized and signed and then we wait. It’s on average a two month production wait. Then it’s shipped by sea and then we wade through U.S. customs, which is always an adventure in and of itself.

Since production time for packaging materials is typically shorter than production of the handbags (which are all made by hand), once the handbags purchase order is out of the way, I focus on getting the packaging produced. It’s not awfully expensive to get that done state-side, so that’s what I’m intending to do.

I apologize to all those who contacted me about Christmas orders. As you can see, we’ve encountered several production bumps and have nothing to sell right now. Production with the prospective new factory won’t complete for another who knows how long. I so wish I had cheerier news to report, but alas.