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Only in New York City...
Walking uptown on Lafayette Street with
speet when I see a mascot suit head on an outdoor cafe table... Seems there's a lady goes by the name of 'Huckleberry' who builds these things - for art gallery display, not 'suiting. (From her website it looks like she only builds heads, not full suits.) Not with traditional fake fur either - she crochets the fabric the head's lined with, giving them a kind of stringy look.
She was kind enough to let me try on her head - felt really good. I gave her a big pitch to attend FurFright next month, since she lives in western Mass., a short drive to the con. Hope she makes it.
Sorry for the pic's fuzziness - it was taken with my cellphone camera. If you're interested you can see more of her work on her site, www.huckandstuff.com
UPDATED: She added her NY adventure to her website:
http://huckandstuff.com/or/tiger/
scroll down a ways and you'll see the picture she shot of me all tigered up.
Walking uptown on Lafayette Street with
speet when I see a mascot suit head on an outdoor cafe table... Seems there's a lady goes by the name of 'Huckleberry' who builds these things - for art gallery display, not 'suiting. (From her website it looks like she only builds heads, not full suits.) Not with traditional fake fur either - she crochets the fabric the head's lined with, giving them a kind of stringy look. She was kind enough to let me try on her head - felt really good. I gave her a big pitch to attend FurFright next month, since she lives in western Mass., a short drive to the con. Hope she makes it.
Sorry for the pic's fuzziness - it was taken with my cellphone camera. If you're interested you can see more of her work on her site, www.huckandstuff.com
UPDATED: She added her NY adventure to her website:
http://huckandstuff.com/or/tiger/
scroll down a ways and you'll see the picture she shot of me all tigered up.
Category Photography / Miscellaneous
Species Tiger
Size 800 x 1000px
File Size 280.4 kB
I agree that the creations of hers are creepy...as fursuits would go. But I'm rather glad to have seen this submission, and seen her website, because now I have a much better understanding of, and appreciation for, those who make such horrible homemade fursuits.
Now don't get me wrong. I greatly appreciate a homemade fursuit. I think the ugliest homemade fursuit looks better than anything made by the "fursuit factories" out there (I'm not naming names, but everyone knows who they are...though I'm not sure anyone realizes that we're up to 3, maybe 4 factories now...within the fandom I mean.) What I don't care for however are the likes of people who make horrid fursuits and sell them. Yes, I allow for growth and acquisition of skills. But I don't abide by someone making absolutely horrid fursuits time and time and time again, and billing people good money for them. Again, I'm not naming names here, but at least the pedophile former friend of mine stopped making fursuits.
Honestly, a big part of why people who make these horrid fursuits continue to do so, and don't improve, is because people praise poor quality work. Look at my first costume, RedFox (http://rexwolf.furtopia.org/fursuit.....s/RedFox-1.jpg). Not a SINGLE person told me how ugly the head is, how crappy he looks because the eyes are too close together, how stupid the lower jaw looks. NO ONE! The ONLY reason I improved my costumes (my latest: http://rexwolf.furtopia.org/fursuit.....es3Resized.jpg) is because I am brutally self-honest, and critiqued the costume, and because I have a high degree of empathy and put myself in the shoes of my customer.
This is a disease in the fandom. People are afraid to criticize. And I put the blame squarely on those of us who are in defacto positions of leadership (myself if for no other reason than because of my age, but also because I try to be a leader.) Yes, it is the trolls who actually apply this pressure; but when the leaders turn a blind eye, they are nodding in approval even if they don't believe they are.
Bottom line. It's okay for a fursuit to be ugly. Not everyone can make a beautiful first fursuit. But take criticism, and to everyone out there, GIVE CRITICISM. Be kind in doing so, but be honest and complete in your critique. If you give honest feedback, the fursuit maker can know what to do next time to make their costumes look better. Fursuit makers have an especially difficult time. How long does it take to create a drawing? How much cost and time is involved? We fursuit makers have little chance to practice, relative to artists of more 2-dimensional mediums and most 3-dimensional mediums. So we need to take criticism more seriously if we're going to improve.
Now don't get me wrong. I greatly appreciate a homemade fursuit. I think the ugliest homemade fursuit looks better than anything made by the "fursuit factories" out there (I'm not naming names, but everyone knows who they are...though I'm not sure anyone realizes that we're up to 3, maybe 4 factories now...within the fandom I mean.) What I don't care for however are the likes of people who make horrid fursuits and sell them. Yes, I allow for growth and acquisition of skills. But I don't abide by someone making absolutely horrid fursuits time and time and time again, and billing people good money for them. Again, I'm not naming names here, but at least the pedophile former friend of mine stopped making fursuits.
Honestly, a big part of why people who make these horrid fursuits continue to do so, and don't improve, is because people praise poor quality work. Look at my first costume, RedFox (http://rexwolf.furtopia.org/fursuit.....s/RedFox-1.jpg). Not a SINGLE person told me how ugly the head is, how crappy he looks because the eyes are too close together, how stupid the lower jaw looks. NO ONE! The ONLY reason I improved my costumes (my latest: http://rexwolf.furtopia.org/fursuit.....es3Resized.jpg) is because I am brutally self-honest, and critiqued the costume, and because I have a high degree of empathy and put myself in the shoes of my customer.
This is a disease in the fandom. People are afraid to criticize. And I put the blame squarely on those of us who are in defacto positions of leadership (myself if for no other reason than because of my age, but also because I try to be a leader.) Yes, it is the trolls who actually apply this pressure; but when the leaders turn a blind eye, they are nodding in approval even if they don't believe they are.
Bottom line. It's okay for a fursuit to be ugly. Not everyone can make a beautiful first fursuit. But take criticism, and to everyone out there, GIVE CRITICISM. Be kind in doing so, but be honest and complete in your critique. If you give honest feedback, the fursuit maker can know what to do next time to make their costumes look better. Fursuit makers have an especially difficult time. How long does it take to create a drawing? How much cost and time is involved? We fursuit makers have little chance to practice, relative to artists of more 2-dimensional mediums and most 3-dimensional mediums. So we need to take criticism more seriously if we're going to improve.
I think you missed the point of what this artist is trying to do. She's not making suits to sell to furs (in fact, it looks like she doesn't make suits, just the heads); she's using the metaphor of the animal to express herself. Her stuff doesn't have to look like a conventional (ie, padded fake fur) suit. That's what a craftsperson does for themselves or other furs who want a suit made to wear to the cons.
The look of her heads is intentional, she's making a personal statement with them. She wears them to public events or performance art presentations and puts them on display in galleries. I don't think a gallery would be interested in displaying something that looks like something you'd see at a theme park. (That's NOT meant as any kind of insult - that's the look 'suiters generally set out to achieve, and more power to them.)
You're free to say you don't care for the look of what she creates, and I admit it took me back at first because the tiger head looked all 'stringy' compared to conventional suits - but she's dressing up as an animal maybe for similar reasons as us, but in a very different venue. Just for comparison, I have a 'skunk jacket' I occasionally wear at cons - an old black sport jacket a friend sewed 2 white stripes down the back. (Plus there's a pin-on tail - nothing plush, just a flat piece of fabric that continues the stripes.) It's not a fursuit by any stretch of the imagination - but that's not what I was going for. I wore it to express the idea of a skunk, using a symbol that everyone would recognize: a more theatrical than literal form of dress-up. I'd never compare it & say it was better or worse than a first class skunk fursuit - it's coming from an entirely different place.
The look of her heads is intentional, she's making a personal statement with them. She wears them to public events or performance art presentations and puts them on display in galleries. I don't think a gallery would be interested in displaying something that looks like something you'd see at a theme park. (That's NOT meant as any kind of insult - that's the look 'suiters generally set out to achieve, and more power to them.)
You're free to say you don't care for the look of what she creates, and I admit it took me back at first because the tiger head looked all 'stringy' compared to conventional suits - but she's dressing up as an animal maybe for similar reasons as us, but in a very different venue. Just for comparison, I have a 'skunk jacket' I occasionally wear at cons - an old black sport jacket a friend sewed 2 white stripes down the back. (Plus there's a pin-on tail - nothing plush, just a flat piece of fabric that continues the stripes.) It's not a fursuit by any stretch of the imagination - but that's not what I was going for. I wore it to express the idea of a skunk, using a symbol that everyone would recognize: a more theatrical than literal form of dress-up. I'd never compare it & say it was better or worse than a first class skunk fursuit - it's coming from an entirely different place.
Oy. Come here you, I'm gonna give you a big fat noogie!
I am in NO WAY complaining about crappily made fursuits, please make sure you understand that. Quite the opposite, I appreciate people going to the effort, even if their results aren't that good looking. I even stated I appreciate a handmade not-so-good looking fursuit over ones made by our fandom fursuit factories (who use molds for the heads...shame shame shame.) But what I don't appreciate are people who make shoddy fursuits, ugly fursuits, and SELL THEM, especially for primo dollar.
*gives you another noogie*
I owe you one in person, okay?
I am in NO WAY complaining about crappily made fursuits, please make sure you understand that. Quite the opposite, I appreciate people going to the effort, even if their results aren't that good looking. I even stated I appreciate a handmade not-so-good looking fursuit over ones made by our fandom fursuit factories (who use molds for the heads...shame shame shame.) But what I don't appreciate are people who make shoddy fursuits, ugly fursuits, and SELL THEM, especially for primo dollar.
*gives you another noogie*
I owe you one in person, okay?
he would make this: http://www.spawn.com/toys/horror/mo.....hoto_01_dp.jpg
I think the streets of Manhattan had more to do with it than me. The block we met her on is sort of right on the border of Greenwich Village, the East Village and Soho - a rockin' neighborhood. But yeah, I did a serious double take when I saw that head on the table next her.
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