Exploring Bowerbird’s journey with owner Peggy Byrne reveals a tale of challenges and triumphs. Through immersive filming, Peggy brings to light the craftsmanship behind the products, showcasing the dedication of Australian designers. Despite misconceptions, Peggy’s commitment to Bowerbird’s identity as a thriving business shines, driving partnerships and ensuring designers value the strategic groundwork. With May’s event on the horizon, anticipation builds for a diverse showcase and interactive workshops, promising enriching experiences for all attendees.
You’ve been running Bowerbird since 2020, what are some highlights you’ve experienced since being in a “post” COVID-world?
Filming some of our designers at their craft was amazing. I wanted to illustrate to our audience the reason why the products they saw at Bowerbird were unique and so personal to the designer.
We shot in a glass blowing studio, a knife maker’s atelier and a wood worker’s shed all in one day. And then another film with a fashion designer, textile artist and painter. I thought I was in awe of them before but after that… well it just reinforced my drive to promote Australian designers even more. The first video is on the Bowerbird website, called Exploring the Craft – Artisans. I hope to have the next one finished this year.
What have been some challenges, and how have you overcome them?
People’s perception of what Bowerbird is has sometimes been surprising to me. Maybe it is because more and more weekend “markets” have popped up in the last few years, but Bowerbird is a business in its own right. And it is my full-time job, my profession. I guess it’s hard to know what it takes to manage this business, because we are only in the public eye for 6 days a year. So it does pose challenges such as finding suppliers that will partner with me for the long term rather than seeing my needs as a one-off hire.
It also impacts designers’ perception of when they need to commit to the event. We need them to do so early enough that they can benefit from the marketing and PR we drive for them as part of their participation. I believe we advertise and promote our designers more than any other market does and so we need to lock in our lineup, discover their unique stories, pitch them to media partners, review images to ensure they are as professional as possible – all of this takes time. It’s crucial that designers value this part of our commitment to them when participating in Bowerbird as it demonstrates the value we can provide to designers above and beyond the actual 3 day events.
What can Bowerbird market-goers expect at May’s Bowerbird?
As always, we received amazing applications for our May event so we have a great selection of designers, makers and producers that we are proud to showcase. With around 25% new designers to the event, there’s lots to discover including eight emerging artists. We have workshops throughout the weekend teaching a variety of painting styles and you can also try your hand at hand-building with clay. And the return of our art gallery curated by local artist Nicole Black should be another delightful representation of the talent in this state!
What are your personal highlights for the May lineup?
I am excited to showcase some of our local producers in a more formal manner this event. As Bowerbird runs on the same dates as Tasting Australia, we have a dedicated area showcasing SA producers. Think wine, pickles, chutneys, gin, premixed drinks, beer, biscuits, olive oils… and chocolate! I love that we can celebrate producers and their labours of love in the same environment as artisanal glass blowers and slow fashion designers. It makes so much sense.
With a changing cultural landscape in Adelaide with businesses shutting up shop due to economic reasons, are you finding this is impacting Bowerbird, or the designers and artists?
Bowerbird’s role is to showcase small creative enterprise and our focus has not waivered during the last few tough years. We may have changed a few operational things to adapt to the economic pressures we were under but only to focus on our core purpose – our commitment to designers. I believe that this is also how many designers and makers have adapted too. Many have focused their business on key products or key outputs. Working smarter where they could, and harder where they had to.
Fortunately, people want to make considered purchases more than ever, ones that will have greater value because of their uniqueness or story, so buying direct from small creative businesses is the only way to go.
What are some goals you have for Bowerbird over the next few years?
I’m keen to engage with some of the many design and artistic bodies in SA to seek direct feedback from their members on what designers and makers might want from Bowerbird in future.
I’d also like to one day have a guest designer curate the event with me and provide expert feedback to me and to vendors so everyone can keep on growing and evolving!
Bowerbird
3rd – 5th of May, 2024
Wayville Pavilion, Adelaide Showground
