We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Tenisha Hendon a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Tenisha , thanks for joining us today. How did you learn to do what you do? Knowing what you know now, what could you have done to speed up your learning process? What skills do you think were most essential? What obstacles stood in the way of learning more?

My love for crafting started at a young age when my baby sitter introduced me to crocheting. I was reunited with crafting when I bought my first Cricut and I made t-shirts for my son’s first birthday party. I was so excited about having this new found therapy I wished I would have taken the time to narrow down my niche instead of trying everything. The skills most essential when using heat transfer vinyl HTV is getting your time and press temperature down. Some obstacles that stood in my way were balancing my full time, with motherhood and being a wife.

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?

My name is Tenisha Hendon. I am the Owner and Creative behind Craftimony. My brand was created for me to share my story through my work. I do this by creating meaningful and purposeful piece that people can use and relate to in their everyday lives. One of my projects that I have started under my brand is clothing and apparel collection called Daily Reminder t-shirts. These t-shirts are designed to provide motivation and inspiration to a stranger in passing. I also create custom and personalized pieces for holidays and birthdays .

I enjoy being creative and having the ability to handcraft something unique and original. I recently taught myself how to sew and currently building on my sewing skill sets. One of the pieces  I sew are table runners. These are designed to be personalized pieces for special occasions and holidays. I use a technique that requires sublimation for my timeline table runners. I ask my customers for photos they like to incorporate and I arrange them in a way that tells a story. It could be a great vacation you took or even a baby shower. Along with sublimation technique I can make coasters to go with the table runner.

To create these unique pieces I primarily use HTV, sublimation, fabric, coasters and blank t-shirts in a variety of colors. I believe learning different techniques and utilizing mix media can set you apart from everyone in the craft industry. I try to stay informed on current trends and new material to keep my work fresh and relevant.

One of the things I am most proud of is being able to emotionally touch my customers. To see there face or read a comment about what they received means the world to me. I’m apart of creating a memory they will always have and keep.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

I believe society should increase the visibility of creatives by supporting and creating more platforms to bring attention to creatives. Supporting can be something simple as like, share, follow, comment. We need more visibility to get our work out there to reach the right target audience.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

My main goal is to create purposeful pieces that inspire, motivate and personalize an experience for my customers. I want my customers to receive their piece and say they will keep this forever, simply because it means so much to them. If I accomplish that in every order, I have done my job.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.craftimony.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/craftimony
• Facebook: facebook.com/craftimony
• Other: TikTok @craftimony Pinterest @craftimony

Image Credits
N/A I created and took photos of my own work