Bazaar Bizarre: Not Your Granny's Crafts!

by Greg Der Ananian

The desire to stand out with quirky, handmade, one-of-a-kind fashion has created a huge new crowd of hip young crafters hungry for ideas. In Bazaar Bizarre, Greg Der Ananian, founder of the bicoastal craft fair of the same name, combines a variety of how-to projects from radical crafters on his bazaar circuit. Speaking to everyone from alternateens to hipster thirtysomethings with an irreverent retro-chic attitude, this book is for those looking to put an edge on the things that grandma used to make. Bazaar Bizarre offers smart, subversive inspiration unavailable from traditional crafting books and patterns, appealing not only to the nostalgia for folk expression of previous generations, but also to the popular DIY attitude of the young and stylish. From silk painting to quilting and bookbinding, projects such as Anarchy Soap and Vinyl Record Cuffs teach basic skills of popular crafts and offer tips on how to creatively customize with thrift store purchases. Readers will love Der Ananian’s sardonic commentary, “Craftoids,” about the history of crafting, punk- rock crosswords, funky finger-food recipes, and musical play lists.

Genres: Crafts, Nonfiction, Reference

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

Reviews

[Bree · Rating 1 out of 5]

disappointed. I waited for some time for another library to track this down and then ship it to my library. I feel bad for wasting their time. You only get one picture of the final product in the middle of the book, not along side the directions on how to make the item (and it is only a few of the crafts, not all of them.) The rest of the how-to pictures are drawn but mostly this is A LOT of reading. This much text in a how-to book makes my eyes blur. For the size of the book there were only 2 crafts that I did like. Not for me, but could be for you. Just borrow it from the library first then decide to pay $17 for it.

[Jessica · Rating 2 out of 5]

Most of this book is bios of crafters in the modern crafting industry. Which can be cool if you'd like to know some of the "who's who" of the craft world, but most of the world famous crafters aren't present (i.e. Jennifer Perkins).
That said, the crafts that are featured (and there's not many) are of an anarchy spin (including the homemade Anarchy Soap). Greg classifies them as "punk," but they not really.
There are some cool ideas in here, but it makes it hard to decipher which ones they are because there are only finished pictures for about half of the crafts.

[Ashley · Rating 1 out of 5]

Thought this would be way cooler. Mostly bios about really weird crafters making crafts that rather suck. I think there are maybe two--bookbinding basics and the skeleton bird postcards--that are useful. The other crafts just don't lend themselves to anything functional or useful. Also, there aren't enough photos of the completed projects. And seriously--how many sock monkey instructions are in this world? This book had a great idea, but also had extremely poor execution.

[Alissa · Rating 1 out of 5]

A little too skull and cross-bones for me.

[Evie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've had this book for two years and haven't done a thing with it. It's neat, but not for me.

[Gus · Rating 1 out of 5]

Too much text, not enough pictures. The one project I would have liked to have done uses such hard to find and expensive materials that its really not worth it.

[NTE · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not what I expected... ratio of chat to craft wasn't what I'd have liked.

[Zola · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun fun fun.

[Shonica · Rating 1 out of 5]

With such a great title I was disappointed that there was nothing in the book that I haven't seen before. And I wasn't impressed with the illustrations.

[Christina · Rating 2 out of 5]

Far too few photos. Funny how quickly a book can date itself.

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

When and if i ever get some free time, this will be the best book ever...

[Jill · Rating 1 out of 5]

Mostly text. Needed more pictures!

[Renee Rothhaas · Rating 3 out of 5]

interesting crafts and a fun writing style.