We recently connected with Lydia Vélez and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Lydia , thanks for joining us today. It’s always helpful to hear about times when someone’s had to take a risk – how did they think through the decision, why did they take the risk, and what ended up happening. We’d love to hear about a risk you’ve taken.
I have always adored art and the creative process since I was a child, and at one time was working towards a major in Fine Arts. However, I started my professional career in education as a Spanish teacher. I taught some form of Spanish from Bilingual Kindergarten to high school Spanish 2 all the way to writing the Native Speakers’ curriculum for my school district. Art was always a constant, though. Especially as I prepared for the births of my two sons, I crocheted, drew, painted, sculpted, and everything in between. In 2020, I interviewed for an open art position on my campus hoping that I would have a better work/life balance and more time for my own creativity. While the COVID pandemic shut down the world that Spring, I went back to painting in my spare time. When I myself came down with COVID and was out of work for 3 months, I was forced to find an additional job. I found it in the local paint party store. The workload of teaching, being a wife, a mother, and also teaching painting late into the night for parties was to say the least, exhausting. So, I came up with the idea of creating a mobile paint party business, and my little home-based side hustle, The Party Brush, was born.
Lydia , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
The Party Brush works very much like chain paint party storefronts, but the benefits of its mobility are endless. Want to have a party in your home? At the park? In a church reception building? Want to rent the local VFW hall? I can do that! While I am located in Houston, TX, and there was some competition in my initial research, they seem to have gone the digital route of packaging and shipping paint kits online. I am constantly working on adding to my gallery so that folks can find something that perfectly fits their event and set up and clean up everything so that the paint party is no muss no fuss for the host. Most paint parties for teenagers or adults take two hours and children’s parties take 1 – 1.5 hours. I think what makes me most proud is that I have built this from the ground up – I had to tailor paintings to fit the clientele I wanted to attract and make sure it was simple enough to be done in 2 hours. For someone who thrives on details in all things, including my personal art, I had to work very hard to create a body of work that was accessible to my clients. I have also done everything by myself – from creating flyers, a website, learning social media algorithms, etc…and that has been a true show of dedication to making the dream real.
Additionally, I take time to work on my own personal art, which focuses on folktales from my grandmother, my own motherhood, and the beautiful cultural traditions from around the world that I so adore. I also take commissions for acrylic paintings and am quite proud of the results and the tiny details that make each piece special.
What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?
I think that aside from it being very much a creative outlet for me that I dearly wish will become my sole income one day, I want art to be accessible to everyone. I have so many students who come into my classroom at school and say “well, I can’t draw/paint/sculpt”, and it makes me so driven to find a way to give them confidence in what they do. My goal at The Party Brush is to give customers a fun experience but also a piece of artwork they can be proud of. I always ask my customers at the beginning of a party “How many of you think this is going to be a disaster?” and most hands go up. By the end of the party though, every painting looks startlingly different and beautiful and so far, no one has left unhappy with their work. I’m extremely proud of that.
In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?
In the “Age of Amazon” and instant gratification, we have to remember that when we have the money, we should consider giving it to the person who makes what you want best – not the most inexpensively. In fiber arts, we often don’t value the product so much as the time put into the creation of the work because it is made by hand – not a machine, not a mechanical loom. In creating art by hand, in any media, we are eschewing modern mechanical innovations and truly “feeling” our way through the creative process, and that and the resulting products make them infinitely more valuable.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.thepartybrush.com/www.vividlyvelez.com
- Instagram: @thepartybrushtx/@vividlyvelezart
- Facebook: @thepartybrushtx
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@VividlyVelezArt
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-party-brush-pearland