In our search for a new factory, we’ve been making samples. This post will showcase a set of the odd ones out. If you’ve been following this blog for some time now, then you have an idea of what each of these bags should look like. Or check out the regular website, www.tarynzhang.com.

So there is no point in posting the samples that came out well, the ones that look identical to the previous batches of inventory. No. Instead, this is a post about failures.

First up, a pretty big flop:

You have not seen this one before. It was a new design I conceived of in December, an utter failing flop of a design. That’s right. It’s ugly. It is an unequivocal manifestation of my failures as an amateur designer. And I’m posting it on my blog.

Some of the stuff I come up with really work and I love them and people love them and just knowing I am capable of coming up with that kind of stuff makes me feel special. Then some other stuff, a LOT of other stuff I come up with really do NOT work. And in fact are quite hideous. Like the one above.

Last Saturday I heard this fellow Frans Johannson speak at a conference about innovation, technology, and social change, called “The Intersection.”  (It was held at Pixar Studios, by the way, an amazing venue.)

I cannot properly recall what he said or how he said it (which was so stirring and powerful), but essentially, Johansson talked about the many failed paintings of Picasso that no one sees or ever mentions, the many failures of all the great minds and brilliant thinkers, but how it was those failures that helped them stumble upon their genius successes. What distinguishes the successful innovator from the rest of us isn’t her mind; she doesn’t come up with “better” ideas than us– it’s her courage to fail. The successful innovator is the one who isn’t afraid of failure.

That was my long-winded way of saying yeah, I failed miserably with that design, but I am not going to be ashamed of it. Not everything I come up with is good. So what?

Now. Not all failures are mine. Here is an amusing sample of The Executive satchel brief that came back from one of the factories:

The Executive in black on the left (labeled “CORRECT”) is what it’s supposed to look like. That’s an image of a previous sample from a previous batch of inventory. I sent the same exact set of design briefs to this new factory and even sent them photographs of the correct version and still I got what you see on the right (labeled “new factory oopsie”). Um, yikes. How did that happen!?

Not only is the silhouette and lines of the bag all wrong (and wrong hardware as well), but they didn’t even create the pleats for the bag as I had instructed in the briefs. I had given instructions on how to create those pleats. Instead, they simply sewed those lines as seen in the “new factory oopsie” image.

The Peripatetic bag has gone through so many versions. So. Many. The one made by this factory is pretty good. I like it. Except it’s a little… I don’t know, squat or something. The intended silhouette should be slightly more elongated, like the black and white illustration you see above to the left. It doesn’t even need much, just an inch or two on the length and it would be perfect. Well, no. Also the handles are a little thicker than I would like. Just those two points, though.

As I mentioned in the previous post, I’m now designing for another designer. In fact, I’ve just been named his company’s new creative director! Isn’t that fun? And I have dived right into work sketching for his 2012 collections. =) He’s made a name for himself in many countries across Asia, but not yet in North America. He’s a recent transplant to Vancouver, and I’ve been brought on to help him develop his label in the west.

At first I was hesitant to join because all his handbags use genuine leather. Lambskin, calf skin, croc, python, you name it, he’s used it. You know my stance on being cruelty-free. Ultimately, I decided this was too great an opportunity and experience to pass up. I know. I’m a sell-out. =( In any case, I figured as long as Taryn Zhang New York remains committed to vegan leather, I can make peace with myself. =)

I can’t wait to give you all more information, but that is to come soon enough, if all pans out as well as anticipated. In the meantime, I can show you two of his past season handbags, above. I *LOVE* love love these two styles, totally adore them.

My main critique of his past lines overall is that there was no cohesiveness, no concrete point of view. Some of the designs, like the two I pictured above, are simple, elegant, and classic. Others are crazy, with fur, leopard print, and bells and whistles, totally wild stuff, designs that make me go blegh. His rationale is that he’s been more of a trend follower, going for marketability. So he keeps a hawk’s eye on what’s going to be “in” next and inspires his designs off that. That is not my approach at all. Fortunately, he respects that and has given me a lot of leeway as creative director. =) Seriously, I can’t wait to share more.

The day job has been busy, so that has left little time for concentration on this blog. Although I haven’t been blogging, I have certainly been working away at the TZ project. =) In fact, I am now officially “patent pending.”

Yeah, yeah, I know what people in Silicon Valley say about design patents versus utility patents. In most respects, I agree with the silliness of design patents, except when it comes to fashion. It makes sense in this industry.

Granted I have no idea whether I filed the design patent application correctly, but I figured I’d just play it by ear. The above was the first time I ever did technical drawings for a patent app. Total DIY here, ladies and gentlemen. We’ll see what happens. =)

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.

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.

I went on and on here about how much I love the above swatch color, which I am dubbing Amaranth Rose (previously referred to as Amaranth Pink in the linked posts). Then, with heavy disappointment, I posted here about how the factory that makes this awesome material no longer makes it. The color was taken entirely out of production. So sad.

Then I thought and I thought and I thought. And thought some more. Did some number crunching, some introspection, some risk analysis, a little bit of everything that would ordinarily make a designer’s head ache. And then I decided.

After some heart to heart negotiations, we convinced the factory to bring it back! Just for us. It’s going to take a couple of months to make it, but that’s okay. We’ve waited this long already. What’s another two months?

We’ll be offering the Workaholic, Executive, and the Precisionist in this color. For the above two images, I scanned in the swatch card and my purse (my holding it steady over the scanner bed while I hit “Scan”) hoping this method would yield a more accurate visual of the color. It appears darker than it does in person. See the previously linked posts for what the color looks like when I shoot it head on with a DSLR, and also here and here.

So. It’s back. Amaranth Rose. I’m excited because I really, really love this color, but I’m also nervous now. Will the returns pay off? Who knows. I went with my gut and I guess by the end of 2012, if nothing else, we’ll know a little bit more about my guts.

Sorry for the lack of updates here. Earlier this month, my little sister got married. Hubby and I took some time off and visited Texas (for my first time) for the celebrations. Holy smokes is it ever hot in Texas! I don’t know how women stay put together down south. Your makeup melts off your face, your hair is perpetually frizzy, and I am a walking, sweaty, shiny mess. Horrors.

My sister agreed to let me post pictures of the beautiful newly wed couple. =P

Below is a pic someone took of Hubby and me. I think it was taken with a camera phone, so it’s kind of grainy. And don’t ask me what’s going on with my hairdo. Before the event, my sister took me to a salon, I sat down in a chair, and a lady did that to me. I had no say in it.

Let’s end with a cute photo of my sisters and me. Clearly, I’m the eldest. Clearly. Sigh. The woes of aging. Nothing makes you feel old like hanging out with two youthful younger sisters who are still full of fun and vivacity.

Oh, and although it isn’t pictured, let the record show that the TZ clutch I had with me at the wedding reception was in Amaranth Rose. =)

Found a pic. But it’s from the night before the wedding.

There’s Hubby and me. And Amaranth Rose. ::love::