If you needed another reason why Etsy is damaging the word “craft”, then here it is.
Un.fucking.believable.
I’m currently working on trying to condense down all the stuff I want to say. I may write a book instead, it’d be easier.
Cross Stitch + Washi Tape
It was my good friend Marceline’s birthday at the end of March and I decided I’d like to make her something that was both cute and featured a bunny. Here’s what I ended up with:
The cross stitch chart is by L’Heure Du The. For the hoop, I took an ordinary wooden embroidery hoop and carefully wrapped it in washi tape I picked up in Amsterdam in February.
It was much easier than I thought it was going to be to keep it neat! I think the colours worked pretty well together.
I’ll definitely be trying out washi tape hoops again – if nothing else, it’s a great excuse to buy some more – I can’t get enough of it!
Business – Still Risky
I’ve been thinking a lot about what to write next following on from my recent posts dissecting the craft scene. There is so much swirling round in my head and reading the comments and emails and messages I’ve been getting after them is adding to that whirlpool.
But I had reason to revisit the post I wrote about Etsy and why I closed my shop down the other day and I felt it was a good time to post it again for new followers of the blog. I didn’t realise I wrote it almost two years ago – I’ve always been one for sniffing out a problem in the making, it seems.
Here it is here. It’s another lengthy read, but stick with it. I felt it was worth going back to this and the points I make (along with some other points – see what I mean about lots swirling round?) in light of next week’s Protesty event.
Protesty are a group of people who believe in the handmade movement, which is the idea behind Etsy, and want to protect that. Like me two years ago, and countless others I’ve read about or spoken to, they’re concerned that it’s not about that any more. Resellers, vintage sellers and knock-offs have flooded the marketplace and to me, Etsy are incapable of policing it to keep it true to its original aim. In protest, concerned Etsy sellers are closing their stores for 24 hours on May 10th. If I still had one, I’d be joining them.
Coincidentally, I also read about some changes over at Folksy today. I also closed my Folksy store after a few copies of my designs popped up, undercutting me massively. And my Dawanda store. And my Artfire store. The same problems I’ve been talking about (for two years) are what led to that. It’s exhausting. And depressing that the situation doesn’t seem to have improved with time, as at least once a week, I see yet another post about someone’s design being copied or infringed.
What are your views on Etsy and Protesty?
Indie-vidual?
I mentioned Craft Seller magazine in a recent post and I realised thought I meant to write about this a while ago, I never got round to it. I became aware of it through a friend, Katy, who had mentioned it on her blog. Go on and give that post a read, and you’ll get a good idea of what’s in the magazine.
As I said in my comment on Katy’s post, the idea of this magazine horrifies me. Having a magazine give you patterns of stuff to make to sell, tell you how and where to sell it makes me sad for the people who have genuine talent and ideas and work so hard to get their work out there. I’m all for people to be encouraged to be creative, don’t get me wrong, but I believe that encouraging people to make a quick buck in this way is fundamentally wrong.
This hasn’t taken up too much of my brain cells of late (I’ve had other things to think about) but when I started to think about it again, I did some research and found I am not alone in this standpoint. And even more worryingly, it seems that the fears Katy touched on around copyright are being borne out. The first thing I saw when I started researching it was this post by a well-known name, Cupcakes For Clara.
And then I found this post where people have already voiced the same concerns as me. And then this one. And this one from someone who’d read it and was really annoyed about the content, too. I could go on but I’m sure you can use Google for yourself.
If you need a magazine to tell you what to make, how to make it and then how to sell it, you are doing it wrong. What I love about the indie craft community is seeing someone take their idea and put it into practice and making a unique piece of work. This magazine goes COMPLETELY against that and only serves to fuel the overcrowding of the marketplace by essentially creating a production line in living rooms across Britain knocking out identical products (of dubious copyright status) being sold for rock-bottom prices and undercutting the pros.
Have you read it? Have I got this all wrong? I’d love to be wrong about this.
Recently Manufactured
It’s not all sitting around pontificating here, you know. Here’s a peek at a new something I’ve been working on.
This iPhone case was a prototype for a new range of kits I’ve designed. It turned out pretty well and is surprisingly durable. After a couple of months usage, it hasn’t frayed or bobbled, so they will be available to purchase soon. I’ve still got a couple more samples to stitch up for photographing then they’re all yours, promise.
Day In The Life Round Up
UPDATE: Lee May at Bonbi Forest also did the Day In The Life – her’s is very interesting! Click here to read it.
Looks like it was just me and Anna at Custom Made who took part this time! Read Anna’s post here.
Anna, you get to choose the next date. Let me know when you choose!
The response to my recent craft-related posts has been rather overwhelming. Apart from that time in primary 5 when I tried to convince Caroline Hoy there was an initiation ceremony of having her head ducked in the sink when she joined our school, I never was one to be the ringleader but it seems I’ve really struck a raw nerve with a lot of people out there, especially in Glasgow. I’m surprised/saddened to hear the problem seems to be more widespread, too. The comments on the post have been great, so give them a read. I’ll be back with another post on the topic in the next wee while.
This Scene Is Dead
So, that was quite the hot potato, my Cautionary Tale post. I am glad that it’s been useful to people who were considering exhibiting at the market in making up their minds whether to or not. If you haven’t read the comments, they are definitely worth a read – here they are. I’ve heard from one of the other stall holders, as you can see, but I’d be interested to hear from anyone who disagreed on my take on the event or who is still planning on attending – it would be good to balance it out though I realise such a person may not exist.
One of the points that has come out of the comments is an interesting if contentious one I wanted to explore (even though it’s going to make me sound like a hideous, bitchy snob).
First though, I wanted to make something crystal clear about the market in question in the last post. I am pretty sure everyone is aware which it is and I wanted to highlight that the markets I have done there in the past were run by a completely separate organisation who planned, marketed and organised it very well and who were great to work with. Let’s call them Organiser A.
The market I attended as an exhibitor there last year was their last one at the venue. I believe a different organisation, let’s call them Organiser B, separate from the venue, organised an event the day after the one I was at last year, which was poorly attended and organised (from the information I have been told by several vendors). It is this Organiser B, along with Venue X that are organising the series of events I have been writing about recently. To clarify further, the first event was run solely by Venue X. Organiser A had nothing to do with it and continue to be awesome.
Here endeth the public service announcement on that. I felt it necessary to be clear on that for the avoidance of any doubt, as several of the stallholders at the event seemed confused over who exactly was behind previous events (which is very sad, indeed).
So, on to the next Big Issue. Several commenters, on the blog, by email and on Twitter, have raised the point of there being a need for an event genuinely showcasing Scottish design talent and selling high-end, quality work. Whilst I agree with the sentiment to a certain extent, I also have concerns that organising yet another event is not the answer.
I have yammered on about this previously, and touched upon it at the end of my last post, but I’ll say it again. The market is completely over-saturated in Glasgow for craft fairs. Here’s a potted history lesson for you. Pay attention, class.
7 years ago, tapping “craft fair glasgow” into Google might bring you up one or two traditional events to choose from locally and a small selection of others further afield, all catering towards the sedate, country crafts type market. Today, it will give you a list of links as long as your arm to events all over the city and beyond. 7 years ago, there was nothing for modern makers to take their work to. The traditional events didn’t want us, so I took the bull by the horns and organised my own event.
The Miso Funky Markets ran for a couple of years, largely in the West End of Glasgow and were, if I can be so bold to say it, successful. We brought together a whole bunch of creative people who were frustrated that they had no outlet for their work in the city, some of whom became great friends. I’m proud of what I achieved (with my then-business partner) and some of the people we introduced to have went on to form businesses together, as well as life-long friendships. Eventually, we felt our work was done – we’d helped establish a thriving indie craft scene in Glasgow and people were taking the idea and running with it. They didn’t need us anymore. We were happy (and tired).
The Glasgow Craft Mafia was born (of which I was a founding member, though left quite some time ago as I couldn’t face the politics of it) which organised events, and a few other markets sprung up which were being put on by people who had sense and the skills and contacts needed to make them a winner. People started running classes, workshops, opened shops and craft cafes. Glasgow was a leader for the rest of the UK and it was great.
As recently as two years ago, the scene was buzzing. I was still excited to be part of it. A core of regular events were being run by some pretty cool people who got the temperature of the market just right. There was the beginnings of cross over between vintage and handmade (a topic for debate on another day). The stalls I had were profitable and the people visiting were into it. They were hungry for unique handmade stuff and they were being fed it in plentiful supply.
Then the craft bubble blew up like chewing 3 sticks of Hubba Bubba all at once. Suddenly, what we’d known for years was being cottoned on to by everyone. This should have been a good thing. TV shows started appearing on our screens extolling the virtues of making things at home and now it wasn’t just acceptable to be sitting at home, crafting for pleasure, the impetus was to set yourself up in business and sell your work. And Etsy and Folksy and the myriad other online marketplaces encouraged that, with their quick-start-low-fees model. Suddenly, everyone who’d ever picked up a knitting needle was in business. A magazine was even launched telling you what to make and where to sell it (don’t get me started…). It was easy. And it was fun. We all got swept away on a wave of under-priced pastel-coloured crocheted bunting and we loved it.
But for every 10 people opening up their Folksy shop and selling assembled jewellery and Cath Kidston fabric keyrings at a massive loss, there was a frustrated genuine designer/maker, trying to make a living, sitting at home, weeping into their receipts shoebox (everyone keeps them in a shoebox, right?).
The online market was now completely overladen with homemade stuff. Some of it was very nice. Some of it was shoddily constructed. Most of it was run-of-the-mill average craft. Heck, I probably even bought some of it, so go ahead and judge me and call me an enabler. Where once it was easy to find something unique that had been designed and made by hand in the UK, you now had to trawl through 30 pages of search results just to find one thing that stood out from the crowd. No one wanted to pay a decent price for a quality, designed, handmade item because they could get something similar for a fraction of the price.
The difference between homemade and handmade is not a matter of semantics. It’s a very important point to highlight that sounds so petty but I know that other designers will understand. Homemade does not equal handmade and handmade does not equal homemade. Selling your work for a price that can only be making you a loss contributes nothing to the craft business community whatsoever. It shows you don’t value your own time and work and you don’t value that of other designer/makers either.
So it was only a matter of time before this trend migrated from the online market place to the real world. Soon we ended up in the position we are in today – with each weekend boasting one, two, three or more craft fairs (and fayres – oh, the fayres with a y!). Where are all the exhibitors going to come from for those? And where are all the visitors going to come from? And what money are they going to be spending given we are in such a parlous financial state, nationally? Think about it.
Glasgow is a small city. We have roughly half a million residents. Even factoring in 5% as being interested, that’s just 25,000 people who might actually want to attend. And I’d be surprised if it was anywhere near that high. So the pool of people to attract is relatively small compared to London and the US. Although I fought hard along with others for several years to change attitudes, it was like pissing in the wind.
The recent market debacle confirmed to me that we have come full circle and we are back where we are 7 years ago. The events we have are largely catering to the homemade and the hobby maker with an ever-decreasing number of genuine designer/makers trying to make a living alongside them. Whilst there is nothing technically wrong with that, it’s not conducive to changing the attitude of the general public and making them value the work from designer/makers.
The word “craft” has become a dirty word again. Jo(e) Public will take one look and write it off as inaccessible and expensive as they are so used to toddling along to their local library or church hall (or wine bar, nightclub, tea room…) and picking up a few vintage-look twee accessories for pennies. So why would they want to spend 5 times the amount on something from the next-door stall? To expand on the analogy, it’s like Primark opened on Hebden Bridge High Street and suddenly everyone’s wearing neon legwarmers.
Is another event really going to do the trick? Or is it just going to be lost in the mire? Itwould have to be an event of epic proportions with a killer venue, a crack marketing team and a juried selection process to really showcase designer/makers to the full potential. That’s several full-time jobs right there. That’s partly why, I believe, the recent market failed – although the venue is in a great location and run by a government body with the resources to market it extensively, having one person half-heartedly organising it alongside their daily job was never going to be enough.
Who is going to take a task of that mammoth proportion on board? Because I can tell you from experience, as can several of my indie business colleagues – there is no money to be made in putting on craft fairs. Every last penny of “profit” absolutely has to go into marketing and promotion, as does every last minute of the organisers’ time. It simply is not enough to book a venue, post it online and expect people to turn up. It does not work. Weeks and months of careful planning is required. Who would take that on?
So, what’s the way ahead? For me, it’s not pouring any more time and effort into events where I’ll always just be sticking out as the expensive one. (Apart from anything else, after this post, I doubt anyone would have me). It feels like a scattergun approach to reaching out to new customers. I’m going to pick my outings carefully. Last year, that meant just two markets in my home city. This year – well, maybe that was it, two weeks ago. I’m going to be focusing on trade shows this year. I had a go last year in Glasgow, but this year, I’m off to London to try it with the big kids (because even in the world of trade shows, the same problem exists). That’s a whole other set of blog posts waiting in the wings though.
And sad as it is to say, I’ve started to distance myself and my company from the word “craft”. My work is designed and made by me and my team of helpers. It is, in the true sense of the word, handcrafted. But I am very conscious that to describe it as such may not be to my benefit.
Lots to think about for me. And maybe for you, too.
Disclaimer: If you’ve not met me in real life, then please be assured I am hopefully not as bitter and bitchy as I might have come across here! Honest! I’m just frustrated that this is happening and no one is talking about it. So leave your comments, I’m interested to hear your views.
Day In The Life 20/04/12
Day in the life, mundane edition…
0700 Wake up. Lee is going to work. The dog comes in and goes to sleep next to me. I insisted we’d never allow the dog in the bedroom before we got him – I think I cracked less than 24 hours in.
0815 Wake up again, have a shower. Drying my hair and the doorbell goes – it’s the gas engineers inspecting our boiler for the letting agency. It should be a 10 minute job, but he’s here for an hour, chatting up Max and telling me all about his dogs. Now we have a dog, it’s like we’re in some secret society, we get all the dog chat. I quite like this though I wish I’d had time to get dressed and tidy up a bit before the guy arrived.
0945 Look at our shiny new cabron monoxide detector. Get dressed. Have breakfast and start sewing.
1145 Still working, have taken a tour of the grounds with Max. He’s now eating a bone, noisily.
1230 Courier finally arrives, so I can go out. Take Max up the back for a run around. He splashes about in the burn, getting his face wet. He is extremely well behaved and doesn’t eat a load of sandwiches some urchin has discarded on the path. We both watch a fat, angry spaniel eat them on the way back. Max looks dejected so I give him a biscuit for being so self-disciplined.
1330 Back to work. Sewing up stuff for Red Door Gallery which I’d hoped to take in person to Edinburgh this week, but as my car broke down the other day, I am stuck on Brownton Mountain.
1430 Still no word from the garage about the car. Not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing.
1520 Touring the grounds again with the dog. Remember the giant box of Maltesers my dad gave me for Christmas and crack them open. Look at the plants we bought last night. It starts to rain so we go back inside.
1545 Lee arrives home. The garage call and break the news that whilst my car has not suffered fatal injuries it will cost more than I paid for the bloody thing in the first place to fix. I am now officially bankrupt for the rest of the month and I only got paid a week ago. Thankfully, once I am off the phone, Lee tells me the news of his payrise, hurrah!
1600 Lee, Max and I go for a walk down to the town centre to get cash out and go to the garage. We spend a while there chatting to the nice man who fixed my car and booking Lee’s in for next week. We then drive up the hill and feed the dog. Lee goes and tends to his plants outside whilst I hang out with the dog and do some more sewing.
1800 We both get changed and get ready to leave the house. Max is staying in with a pig’s snout for company. We have a snack and get in the car, it’s nice to be driving again.
1845 Arrive in Glasgow and park up – we are off to the theatre to see Monkee Business, a musical based on the music of The Monkees. A workmate gave me some free tickets, so we are going with an open mind. I’d give it a 6 out of 10. I realise that Peter Tork is not the one in the hat and am a bit sad.
2200 Leaving the car park, some dullard forgets to pay and holds us all up at the turnstile (not us). We head to Istanbul, the Turkish takeaway, rather than the city, for a late dinner of chicken pitta breads. MMMM.
2300 We arrive home and eat our very late dinner. The dog is delighted to see us, but not so delighted that we didn’t bring him any dinner. One last tour of the grounds for him and then bed, as I’m working in the morning. Zzzzz.
A Cautionary Tale
I’ve been trying to formulate a post about my experience last Saturday for over a week now and I’m still no further forward, really. Maybe stream of consciousness fact reportage is the way to go. Let’s try it.
I’ve done more craft fairs and markets than many of you have had hot dinners. From church halls to massive exhibition centres, free stalls to mega-spendy stands, I’ve seen them all. I’ve been a bit out of the loop for the past year or so, as I feel that Glasgow’s craft market scene is hideously over-saturated with sub-par events (ooh, hark at me) and the good ones have been wound up. So, it takes a lot to get me packing up my craft suitcase (it’s the size of a small planet) these days. So when I saw a Glasgow city centre venue that I’ve done events at before was launching its own design-led market, I thought it was a pretty good reason to get back into the groove.
I applied for a stall and was accepted. I paid my £40 and made my preparations for the day, like any other event. In the days leading up to the event, I started to get a bad feeling. I hadn’t seen much online chatter about it and my radar was pinging. I began to think I’d maybe backed a wrong horse several days before I even set foot in the venue. One of the things that made me feel this way was the organisers of the event, who run the council-run venue, emailing me to harrass me about distributing paper flyers and why hadn’t I picked any up from the venue? Having paid £40 for the stall, none of which I knew was going towards actual venue hire, this grated on me. I replied stating that as I live 20 miles out of town, I wouldn’t be collecting any flyers but I’d be happy to hand a few out to my colleagues if they posted me some (they arrived on Friday this week, almost a full week after the event). This set my alarm bells chiming quietly. I’d already blogged about the event and Tweeted, too, with a note on my to-do list to email my extensive mailing list and set up a Facebook event a couple of days beforehand, which I did.
Usually with events of this nature, an email will land in my inbox with last minute reminders of important times, places and instructions of what to do on arrival. No such email appeared with me, so I took a last look at the basic information, packed up my case and set off on the journey to the big city with my mum in tow, as she happened to be visiting. We arrived at the venue a little early to find it all shuttered up. My bells started ringing a little louder. With an entrance time of 9.30am to be set up for 10.15am, I was concerned. Where were the organisers? Well, maybe they’d completed set up the day before. It’s not unfeasible. I’m sure it will be fine. At 9.30, we were let in to the building by a member of staff. A few stallholders had gathered by then, so we had company. We all traipsed into the foyer and waited for direction. Eventually, someone came up and told us we could go up to the first floor, where the room for the event was.
Having been to the venue before, and exhibited in Room 1 previously, I knew where to go and headed straight for the lift. We alighted and opened the big heavy double doors to the room to be greeted by a dimly-lit, half-decorated room with a bunch of tables all randomly placed together in the centre of the room, like someone had just dropped them there. We milled around for a few moments until someone appeared and started to mutter about who needed wall space? I took this as my cue to spring into action – no one had identified themselves as the organiser of the event and we were clearly being left to our own devices. I ditched my stuff, grabbed a table and carried it to the far side of the room, opposite the door and in front of a large window to ensure I got some sort of lighting. My bells? Clanging.
We got to work setting up the stall. I had been worried about not having enough stock beforehand but I knew I’d be fine. I already knew this was going to be a quiet day. I’m not exactly psychic, but I could tell from this level of disorganisation that things were not likely to have been much better on the promotional side of things, despite my best efforts (and no doubt those of the other exhibitors) to the contrary. We set up within the now-even-narrower time frame and surveyed the scene. As everyone had been left to their own devices, the room was not laid out appropriately – all the knitwear people were at one end of the room, meaning customers skimmed everyone in that area. I was situated between two stalls, who both had lovely knitted items, high-end and professional outfits, but who were hurt by their location. That’s nothing though compared to the people who were tucked away round the back of the dimly-lit room behind other stalls because no one took charge and provided a lay out for the stalls. One stall had beautifully designed, unusual jewellery but no one could see it as there was no light in that corner.
Another concern was the atmosphere – before the doors even opened, everyone was in a bad mood. This was only exacerbated by the echoing silence in the room. The person in charge made themselves known after we’d set up, so I asked if music was going to be playing, as it was quiet to the point of putting people off. Someone was dispatched to sort it out and eventually we had some music. I think this must have been an after thought, as I distinctly recall hearing Walking In The Air at one point!
Customer wise, footfall was dismal. The venue later stated they’d had 1500 visitors but as they were only counting people coming into the building, not the market, that was a gross overestimation. I, myself, walked in the front door at least 3 times and my mum about 5 or 6, so the figures quoted were clearly not to be relied upon for accuracy. For the first couple of hours, the only people who ventured in were OAPs coming in out the cold or foreign tourists who were clearly in the building anyway. Neither, from past experience, are big spenders. A handful of actual customers came in, did that rabbit in the headlights thing when they noticed us all expectantly staring at them, and did a sharp u-turn back out of there. It did pick up in the afternoon a bit but this was more through luck than carefully targeted promotion.
We saw for ourselves the promotion that was going on outside – or rather, we didn’t. The organisers insisted they had someone out on the street flyering all day, but we didn’t see them any of the times we were out. Someone did say they saw a guy handing out flyers by the street corner but that he wasn’t targeting anyone except the people already heading to the building. There was no signage to direct people in to the building except a tiny sign next to the entrance. There was a whole host of awesome design-led goods on offer inside but no one knew we were there. Several of my indie business associates popped in for a look as they were considering taking a stall for the next event but after seeing the lay out, promotion and hearing the tales from the front line, they decided against it. Word spreads fast among our community – no one was happy that what could have been such a great flagship event for Glasgow designers was being squandered by poor organisation and management.
It’s clear to see that it was not a good day. I didn’t even make my stall fee back, never mind transport costs, etc. At the end of the day, once I’d begun packing up everything to take home again, the organiser came round and asked everyone for feedback. I was honest and said it had been a really disappointing day, that it hadn’t been promoted enough and that I’d like to formulate my opinions and email them instead. The husband of one of my stall neighbours was not so calm. In fact, he went completely off his nut and shouted rather loudly, at length, about just how mis-managed the event was and how poorly promoted and generally disorganised the day had been.
It didn’t register with me for a while that he was really giving the organiser the full hairdryer-in-the-face treatment but after a while, he stopped, the organiser, credit to them, thanked him for his feedback, and moved on. At one point, I did fear that he was going to get physical, but the riot was averted and calm was restored (ish). The surrounding stall holders gathered for a conflab about his comments – and it turns out we were all on the same page. We were all angry to have wasted a day, not to mention all the prep time, when the organisers clearly didn’t value us or our efforts. It was good to hear it wasn’t just me being irrational, but sad that we’d all had such a wasted time of it.
To be fair to the organisers, they did email round a few days later to say it hadn’t gone as well as they’d hoped. I fed back on all the above but really, it felt like pissing in the wind. I’d already decided, thanks to the cacophony of alarm bells ringing for me, I wouldn’t be going back to waste another £40 on it. Some of my comments clearly fell on deaf ears but I hope that they do sort themselves out as there is a dire need for a quality event in Glasgow. The market is over-saturated with amateurish craft fairs which are over subscribed with hobbyists selling off their work for a pittance. Ooh, doesn’t that make me sound like a craft snob? But it’s true – the public see this and think it’s acceptable to undervalue handmade and design-led items because the constant message they’re given is that it’s all knitted wine glass cosies and kit-assembled jewellery (I’m looking at you, Sloans) and isn’t it all a fanciful lark that these funny people are MAKING things they could just buy in Primark.?
LE SIGH. So, yeah, that was that. I hope this helps people make a decision about taking part in the event – I know I haven’t named and shamed, but I also know that local people will be able to tell what I am talking about. And if you can’t, well, maybe you’re just daft enough to give it a try for yourself!
Happy Songkran
Songkran!, originally uploaded by mooosh ♥ miso funky.
Songkran ends today and I realised it’s been a full 4 years since I had a crazy and soggy day in Bangkok celebrating it with friends both British and Thai. Time flies!
Check out my photos of Songkran here.
Songkran is Thai new year, essentially. It’s just gone the year 2555 in Thailand – they have a solar calendar as well as our one, so you can pretend you live in the future whilst you’re there!
Creme Egg Chart
creme egg chart, originally uploaded by gemma correll.
SO TRUE.
p.s This is by Gemma Correllwho is ace.
Gadding About
I’ve been doing a lot of water-based gadding about recently. It’s easy to, with the dog in tow. He likes walking and sniffing, I like wandering around after him. It’s a win-win situation. Some photos of the beautiful weather and countryside from the past wee while above. I’m so glad we moved to such an amazing part of the country.
Jam Hot
This blog as a whole goes off in all sorts of different directions at no notice – much like my brain. So excuse me following that stream of tirades up with a post about jam-making. It took my mind off the woeful state of the economy yesterday.
I made some jam 2 years ago from some raspberries we picked. I gave my Dad some. He still raves about it. This is rare from my father. I have vowed to make more jam, so I snaffled up a job lot of plums from the lonely abandoned fruit section of the supermarket last week. They were actually pretty un-ripe, so I left them stewing in their own plastic for a while and then finally got round to making it yesterday.
Jam making is one of those things that you think is going to take forever and be difficult and messy and you need lots of equipment for. It’s really not. It’s dead easy. Here’s how I make it:
Firstly, and stick with me here, take a side plate and put it in the freezer. Just do it.
Get a load of plums. I had roughly about a kilo.
Get a slightly less quantity of sugar. I used 900g. For plums, because they are naturally high in pectin, there’s no need to use fancy jam sugar. Ordinary caster sugar will do. Because I am a country housewife, I happened to have a couple of jars of vanilla sugar* in my pantry (oh, yes, I have a pantry. It slides out the wall and everything. JELS.), so I used a jar of that and the rest caster, probably about a 70:30 split.
Chop up the plums a bit, add about 250mls of water and stew them in a large pot for about 30 minutes. You should bring it to the boil and then simmer it for a bit. It might take longer if, like me, you forget to add the water at the start and have to add it about 10 minutes in.
Once the fruit is all nicely broken down and you have what is looking worrying like a lumpy fruity soup, add the sugar. You should be stirring it over a low heat until all the sugar has dissolved. You can see when it has dissolved by looking at it on the spoon – no granules. This took a lot less time than I thought it would.
Then you need to wang the heat back up and boil it for 10 minutes or so. You should resist the urge to stir it but I did a bit to make sure it didn’t stick to the bottom of my pot. This is where it can get a wee bit scary. Don’t boil it for too long – you’ll know when too long is – it will go all gloopy and start to smell like toffee. That’s too long. If in doubt, take it off the heat.
To check it’s ready, take a wee spoonful of jam and dollop it on that plate you’ve just taken out the freezer. It will set and look a bit like, well, jam. If it’s still runny, boil it a bit more. My test is to run the spoon through the middle of the puddle of jam. If the two sides stay separated more or less, it’s jam.
Whilst all this has been taking place, you should have been sterilising your jars. I do hope you read through this before you started cooking. I never throw a jar away, I have boxes of them in the garage. My guilty jar-hoarding shame. But who’s laughing now, eh? To sterilise, wash them thoroughly. Put them in a low oven, about 140, whilst you’re making the jam. For the lids, stick them in a pot of boiling water for a few minutes, just prior to you being at the end of jam making.
When the jam’s ready, take your jars out the oven, being careful not to a) burn yourself or b) touch the insides of them. Ladle your jam into the jars whilst both are hot – it will stop the jars cracking. Take your lid out the water and screw it on tight whilst still hot – this creates the seal which will keep it fresh. No fannying about with wax discs and cellophane here.
Et voila – jam.
Bonne Maman, eat your heart out. This is a kind of variation on this recipe, which is a handy one as it gives you info on other soft fruits, too. I say variation as I started reading it about half way through the process when I lost my post-it with my own method scribbled on it. It tastes really nice, that’s the main thing. The above was enough for 3 jars. I have enough plums for about 4 more. Hurrah!
*You can make vanilla sugar really easily too. Get some ordinary caster sugar. Get a vanilla pod. Cram them both in a jar. Leave for ages. You can even keep topping the jar up when you’ve used the sugar. See also St Clements sugar (replace vanilla with dried orange/lemon), lavender sugar (dried lavender), etc.
