We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Tilly Dewey a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Tilly , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?
I’ve always been a maker of sorts as long as I can remember. A maker in design school, a maker in work, a maker in my personal and home life. After design school I began my career as an Interior Designer working for an architecture firm in SLC that I had aniticapted being with for some time. During my lunch break on a usual day I felt really nauseas which was so unlike me, I went to the nearest grocery story and picked up a pregnancy test. I was pregnant… later we find out with twins! I was miserable my whole pregancy trying to find the upside of saying ” goodbye” to this firm along with so many other things. We were also moving to Spokane for my husband to attend law school at the time. It was hard, I was moving away from family, friends a great job to now facing the unknown as I said goodbye to design forever.. so what I thought… When we arrived in Spokane my husband went to law school and there I was trying to support my husband, my twin girls, my identity somehow and everything else at once. I cried and drank diet coke alot.. I even went to the park with two different shoes on a sandal and a sneaker.. that’s where I was, to deep, I was sinking not swimming. One thing however did fill that void of not creating anymore was my twin daughters. We would play all the time together. When I would watch them play over time I began to realized my girls had a natural instinct toward design and creativity. I found myself getting inspired by them, their magic and the joy of childhood that I was forgetting. We began creating together, playing more but enjoying it. This brought about the business I have today called ” PlayHouse” inspired by my girls Sam and Annie. We did ALOT of playing in our home by Manito park ( hence the name PlayHouse) . I began creating masks and costumes, coloring pages, party accessories, DIY activities etc. Everything centered towards the playfulness of childhood. Brands began to reach out to me about styling and creating product for them, I was creating magic, I was making again and it felt good. With this said the most meaniful project I am doing and will forever do is continuing to make magic for my daughters Sam and Annie and for all the other children to help them to continue to be inspired by their playfulness and their natural instinct toward design and creativity.
My most meaniful project is on going, I’m a maker of magic. I have learned that hard things happen and will continue to happen but that doesn’t mean the magic is not there. Sometimes the magic doesn’t always come easily. I had to let my emtion be present, magic is usually created after the hard part.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers
I’m Tilly, the creator behind all of this. I want you to get a feel for who I am and what I believe in. I am a designer by profession, kind hearted, a believer in consistency, a believer of loving hard, and working even harder to show my girls you can create a life full of magic. PlayHouse is inspired by the playfulness of children. My study in design helped me quickly learn after I became a mother all the different ways I could still create. This lead me to create imaginative products for childen to purchase, styling photoshoots for various companies and creative collaborations. As my girls had gotten older it became very important to me that I keep this magic of childhood alive in them, that after a certain age the magic doesn’t go away but to teach them how to use the magic and know they have it and what they can do with that magic. I do this by empowering Children ( girls) of all ages that join my craft camps or buy my products that you can feel brave and empowered by creating and feeling confident and by what you make. ” Magic Makers” Each summer I host craft camps for girls to come, and learn the different types of craft to inspire and excite them. We do various activies such as painting, sewing, one minute sculputres, flower arranging, headshots of each of the crafters, various types of drawings using different mediums. They leaved excited and empowered with a portfolio full of all the crafts they did that week. On Tuesday, I teach ” Art Class On a Tuesday” where we learn the elements of art and encourage creating using your unique perspective. Lastly I still work with my own brand creating DIY’s, collaboarting , styling with other companies, and selling products and clothes. What sets me apart from others is that I want to empower ( girls) /children to create and understand that we all have magic. I really try to offer and create products that make you happy when you see them- you are always left with something. Magic is contagious, magic is usually very simple to create- people just forget they still have it. I want others to create magic. that’s how I’m different- I empower people with magic. Sometimes parents are afraid or hesitate of the ” mess” that crafting and making magic brings- I solve that problem by offering classes that allow messes and creativity in a space that this is encouraged. I change the narriative that messes are bad- I’m proud of all my messes that I make, my crafters make, my girls make and all the glitter always on the floor. Thats the real magic of all this.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
Life doesn’t happen how you usually think it will, most the time it doesn’t. Expectations aren’t mett in yourself or others…life just happens. Life can be dissapointing and hard at times. Sometimes we look at others, we want to be like them, we want their success, their life, their potiential. You can get caught in this trap and you forget about YOU… and why your doing what your doing. When I had my girls and choose to be 100% available to them that was not an easy decision to make with several factors that went into play and this decision wasn’t so black and white. It was hard. I sound selfish but it was. Choosing this journey of being a creative an artist and a mother comes with so many challenges at times. I find that in these challenges is when I become the most resilent and strong to my vision, my girls and my goals. I found in Motherhood that I could still be true to myself, create a magical life and still be available to my girls. This is a challenge everyday, but one I’m willing to do. Motherhood for me has made me resillent. Motherhood helped me find magic in childhood and my company ” PlayHouse” sometimes our expectations and life happen for reasons that may actually be benefical to us. I had to stop the comparing, and just create. That’s what I do- I make magic to and in that I found resilence to keep going.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
The most rewarding and exciting aspect of being an artist or creative is that you are always changing , evolving, one project leads to another a contast flow no matter how fast or long it takes to get there -you are getting there.. you are creating a vision you had in your mind and bringing that to life. That’s beyond rewarding, that’s magical. One of my most favorite projects was a costume series I crafted for Maire Claires Idees, one of the costumes I created was a cotton candy costume that was visionary in my mind- I wanted the child to be seen as a full piece of cotton candy from head to toe. I wanted the costume to look like you could eat it, yet easy enough to make that anyone doing the DIY would also feel confident. That was exciting to bring that to life. The downfall also about creating something you see in your head is that sometimes that gets all consuming.. my girls have cereal for dinner when that happens..
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.thatplayhouse.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thatplayhouse/
Image Credits
Emily Hawkins, Oliver Tingey, Anna Killian