Etsy, Etc.

On Wednesday at Endgame, Amy C. was handing about postcards about a showing of local Etsy artists at the STUDIO gallery. I knew Kimberly would like it, so I passed on the postcard to her, and we ended up going out there tonight.

The gallery was small, but very pleasant, and they had a huge amount of material from Etsy artists. There was quite a bit that we both found attractive.

Many, perhaps a majority, of the showcased items were "things you hang on walls". Amy had a few paintings variously of squids, tentacles, and cancerous growths. It was cool to see them in a gallery setting. I also quite liked some paintings done of bus routes and local streets, of all things. They were really tight shots, just showing a couple of blocks, and I thought they were pretty cool  (not part of the Etsy show, apparently). The thing that Kimberly and I both liked best though were some weird mixed media pieces that were broken glass on some type of colorful background, with words forming a shape in the middle (not Etsy, and I can't find samples of them on the site, which is a pity, as it's hard to describe their attractiveness). We considered buying one, but couldn't find any whose shape and form we found universally attractive (Kimberly later said she thought they were intended as gifts, so the words were supposed to describe the giftee rather than the shape, which might have been our problem). Still, I found some dragonflies and a yellow bird pretty cool.

There was also lots of cool jewelry, which is what Kimberly was looking for the most as she's gotten several necklaces from Etsy. I found many of them quite beautiful, though I'm not much of a jewelry wearer. Still, it was nice to look at them and see the various craft. It was like an episode of Project Accessory right in front of us.

Overall, quite a nice gallery and a fun show to spend 30 or 45 minutes wandering through.

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The wander to the Gallery was a bit less nice. We got off at Powell BART and walked about 1.5 miles to the west side of Nob Hill, where the gallery is located (and thankfully not really on the hill, though it was slightly uphill there). On the way there were two or three blocks were suddenly half the businesses were closed and every three feet there was a homeless person slumped against a wall.

So we decided to avoid that bad area by instead returning to Civic Center BART. The 1-4 blocks north of the Civic Center turned out to be even worse, full of drunkies and druggies lurching about. Ugh.

Anyway, we made it there and back safely, but I'm often amazed how the entire tenor of San Francisco can change in a block.

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Afterward, back in Berkeley, there was eating out (Chaat Cafe) and grocery shopping (Trader Joe's), but we're now nearly passed out back at home. Turns out 3+ miles of walking (+ biking before & after), half of it slightly uphill, plus a long, slow passage through a gallery in the middle, is more than either of us are used to. So, tired.

No gaming tomorrow. So, relaxation.