The CraftSanity Podcast

For years Grand Rapids fiber artist Megan Roach has been experimenting with natural dyes and crocheting and knitting. She was having fun with her creative work, but struggling to tie it all together. And then she started weaving about a year ago.

With deliberate lines and tiny stitches, Megan Eckman is a fine artist and a creative writer behind Studio MME who became an embroidery designer soon after realizing craft stores were still selling the same patterns she stitched with her grandmother.

In her new book, “Novel Living: Collecting, Decorating and Crafting with Books,” Lisa Occhipinti once again pays homage to the printed word.

Hear how three men have realized their long-term goal to transform the Dinderbeck collective space into a community printshop – a project that has been four years in the making.

Last month I recorded a lovely chat with Meredith Crawford, a stylish craft blogger who documents her creative life at onesheepishgirl.com. Tune in to find out how she landed a book deal during her job search and kept the faith that things would work out when her post-college job hunt felt like it might last forever.

More than three decades after macrame permeated the American craft landscape, it’s once again growing in popularity and Sally England has had a hand in that. However, becoming a nationally recognized macrame artist is probably most surprising to England herself.

A fine art painter with a soft spot for crafting, Kelly, 35, just opened the Wisemaker Creative Reuse Store and Studio at The Geek Group, the maker space at 902 Leonard St. NW in Grand Rapids. Part craft supply thrift shop, part drop-in studio, Wisemaker is a place where local creatives can go to take workshops, use the studio space and buy unique reclaimed supplies donated by local businesses and individuals.

Ryan Spencer Reed’s quest to understand the life of a soldier and his family’s own tradition of military service led him to immerse himself in this documentary project and pursue a true understanding of war – something average citizens can’t get from mainstream media.

Interview with ArtPrize artist Anila Quayyum Agha, whose work “Intersections” casts opulent 32- by 34-foot shadows onto the walls, floor and ceiling of the exhibition space at the Grand Rapids Art Museum.

Sometimes, handmade business partnerships start in the most unlikely ways. Sean Maginity was working in the maintenance department at the Grand Rapids Public Library when he fell for Marianne Gardner, a woman at the reference desk. Their relationship and cross-country relocation may have surprised some friends and relatives, but “it worked out,” Gardner said. Little did Gardner know she was about to fall in love again — this time with plants.

Interview with author of "Let's sew Together," by Rubyellen Bratcher.

I met Jamie Malden at the quilt show and fell hook, line and sinker for block printing and the lovely blocks she sells on her Colouricious website.

The story behind a 120 feet long by 10 1/2 feet high "Quilt of Belonging."

The second part of the interview with printmaker Eric Hoffman.

Eric Hoffman is a kind printmaker I met on Instagram while attempting to soak up all I can from more experienced printmakers creating inspiring work.