#nextchapter
Black Line Crazy launches in Mexico. What a ride it's been!
In 2016, Van landed back in San Miguel de Allende from Los Angeles for a quick visit. Friends thought she might be interested in an abandoned house in the artistic colony of Guadalupe. When she first saw the lot, it whispered, what took you so long?
That abandoned house is now a transformed. #blacklinecrazy immersion studio space. It's where she painted the work for her first exhibition at Lourdes Rivera's Galeria Manuk and commissioned the first lineup of handwoven 100% wool pieces showing off her Black Line Crazy designs. (They sold out.)
It wasn't long before she turned to researching how to bring Black Line Crazy to life across a collection of designer totes, messengers and zippered sleeves. She visited Leon, the leather capital of Mexico,
a 2 1/2 hour drive away, and now has assembled an enthusiastic team of masters in the craft.
For her first Street Talk Collection of bags, Van was not interested in working with leather. She chose a polyvinyl (60% polyurethane, 40% polyester) and found a printer in Mexico City who tested the printing of Black Line Crazy paintings on the material, embossing for texture, laminating with an aqua seal and adding another protective process to protect the inks. A highly sophisticated and complex printing process, it took more than 20 months to research, test, research (again) before going into production.
At the same time, Van had tracked down a master craftsman and his family of weavers to collaborate on one-of-a-kind pieces for the Wool Collection.
Grateful for the support and creative collaboration with Mexican artisans, weavers and makers, Van launched her first Black Line Crazy Limited Edition Collection on July 1, 2019. The collection will also be available in galleries, museums and boutiques in the USA in 2020. Poco a poco. (Watch this space!) blacklinecrazy.com