Our Story
Leeloo is an online community for upcoming Australian designers and emerging artists to have a web based environment within which to sell their goodies whilst continuing their focus on their practice. The web site can be found here : http://www.leeloo.com.au We are based in Sydney, NSW, Australia and are a very small community business.
I (Angela) started Leeloo with a mission to provide online commercial exposure to young people who show talent and need a start, but may not necessarily have the time or skills to do all of the work themselves. Whilst a lot of these designers have their own Etsy stores (http://www.etsy.com), Leeloo provides an opportunity for them to be grouped amongst other like-minded Australian designers, and provides focused attention to their products within a nurturing community-based environment.
Renee joined our team nearly two years ago. I met Renee through Leeloo, because she was a sweet young thing looking
for someone who could help get her art out there. Originally an artist and crafter that was part of the Leeloo family, she showed great initiative in wanting to learn the business, as well as work with me (Angela) on setting up exhibitions and how to kick-start her own career as a stylist.
Renee is now an
essential part of the Leeloo team, and provides enthusiasm, passion,
hard-work and raw talent to all of our endeavours.Renee also has a successful blog of her own where she supports international art, design, photography and more. (http://www.renee-anne.com.au)
We spend a great deal of our time promoting the work of the Leeloo family, be it through press coverage, advertising, written editorial contributions both in print and online and pride ourselves in being able to give helpful advice to those who have just begun their journey from hobby to potential self-employment through something creative that they enjoy. I (Angela) also provide ethical fashion styling services to people on the odd occasion (you can see some of my work on The Loop - http://www.theloop.com.au/app/people/portfolio/angela), and I prefer to use Leeloo family goodies whenever I can, or those from within the Australian indie community.
Leeloo is a 'curated' store, in that we take submissions from those who wish to be part of our team. We also promote the work of the indie artistic and design community-at-large through our blog, as well as our regular stall at the massive Finders Keepers market, held bi-annually in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne.
This further extends our support with exposure to new audiences for our team of designers and artists, and allows them the opportunity to have a presence at the market should they not have a stall themselves (either due to distance, cost or that their own submission was unsuccessful to have a stall).
We have also curated and completely project managed five art exhibitions,
including Once Upon, DisBand, Drawn From Fashion. Each of these exhibitions has been a theme based exposition of independent young Australian artists, not all of which are necessarily part of the Leeloo store itself.
Leeloo has been active for over three years now, and has carved a sweet niche for itself in the hearts of our followers, and in the loyalty of the designers and artists we work with, but we have hit a point in the life cycle of our business where we require some inspiration, guidance and new ideas.
The Impact
The first Etsy conference (Hello Etsy - http://www.helloetsy.com) will be held this year in Berlin in September. The conference will focus on sustainability in small businesses and will include speakers and sponsors involved within the Etsy community, the worldwide community of designers and artists, and beyond.
In order to continue to gain the latest knowledge to support the Leeloo mission and the best kind of support to our growing family of designers and artists, for us to gain further knowledge and maintain our expertise in this area, it is imperative that both myself and Renee are able to learn from the world leaders in small online design business retail; Etsy and it's community.
Berlin being one of the world's top destinations for art galleries, exhibitions and other creative events, will allow us to experience first-hand the latest ideas in art, design, exhibiting, to see how the global benchmark is being set, and therefore bring these ideas and inspiration back home to not only Leeloo, but to share that vision with our local community, in both Sydney and Australia.
What We Need & What You Get
We need to buy our tickets to the conference which are 85 Euros each (x 2).
We need our accommodation for a week in Berlin which will be approximately 500 Euros (we'll be staying in small apartment rentals / bed and breakfast type accommodation).
We need money for our airfares, which at this stage will cost approximately $5000 AUD.
We'll also need some survival money for the week, for food and such. We think that will be around $1000 AUD.
So, we're going to ask you lovely people to help us get at least partially towards our target.
Renee and I are currently going through our 'stuff'. We're going to be holding an online garage sale to hopefully raise some of the funds we need and we'll be continuing to work towards our goal as we're super keen to get there.
You can help us with a financial contribution ranging from $10 to $250. Each level of contribution provides you with a perk. Perks include raffle tickets, discounts, art prints and originals. If you contribute any amount, you will know that you have supported our work at Leeloo, and therefore supported the Australian independent art and design community. We will be eternally grateful. :-)
Other Ways You Can Help
We understand that not everyone is in a position to assist
us financially. If you would still like
to help us, please tell your friends and family and anyone who you think might
be interested in our mission about our project.
Spreading the word always helps!
You can do this by sending an email link to our project, sharing the
link on Facebook, or tweeting the link using your twitter account. Thank you very much!
