Odd Crafter has hosted various beginner-friendly arts and crafts workshops since early 2022. Its founder, Shin Yeoh, has much to tell about its origins and the challenges it faces.
By JY Tan
When I met Shin Yeoh at the Odd Crafter studio, she was sitting at a long wooden table with several other women. All of them were holding embroidery equipment except for Shin, who simply observed as the others concentrated on their handiwork.
“They’re our participants for today’s workshop,” Yeoh explained. “Feel free to look around, we should be done in a few minutes.”
The studio itself was spacious, yet cosy. Six hanging shelves proudly displayed some of the Odd Crafter instructors’ creations, including crocheted animals, an artwork made entirely with washi tape, and an angpau Yeoh had decorated with golden koi-themed lettering.
Odd Crafter’s origins
When the interview began, I was surprised to learn that Odd Crafter had only been around for a year and three months. Yeoh had hosted watercolour painting and calligraphy workshops before, but the concept of a studio space dedicated to these workshops didn’t come about until April 2022.
“After that, I found some other artists to collaborate with, like Erica,” Yeoh pointed to the embroidery workshop’s instructor behind us, “and others who do things like crocheting, candle-making and more.” The Odd Crafter team consists of 10 people, who each host one specific workshop every few months, except for the watercolour painting and calligraphy workshops that she hosts personally.
Every weekend, a different workshop
The planning process for all of Odd Crafter’s workshops, Yeoh explained, starts with a Google Sheets document. Once the team figures out who hosts which workshops for the upcoming month, Yeoh turns that schedule into social media graphics and promotes it on Odd Crafter’s Facebook and Instagram pages.
“I wanted to share these crafts with more people,” Yeoh said when I asked her about the reason she started Odd Crafter. That’s why most, if not all, of Odd Crafter’s workshops are beginner-friendly. They even have kid-friendly workshops for families who are looking for a good bonding activity, such as the splash art workshops they hold every weekend.
“We originally targeted adults,” Yeoh said, drawing back a curtain to reveal the paint-splattered art room, “but as it turns out, kids love it because they can’t make a mess at home, but they can here. It can be hard to clean up, though,” she added, indicating the floor outside the art room, where participants often walk past with paint dripping off their protective raincoats.
The hidden challenges of Odd Crafter
Later on, she talked about the many challenges that came with managing the studio. For one thing, the studio’s rental alone costs several thousand ringgit a month, and the logistics of organising and promoting the workshops can be overwhelming for Yeoh.
The greatest challenge for Yeoh, however, was Penangites who were put off by their workshop fees. Many people think all arts and crafts workshops should cost roughly the same price as a store-bought product, but paying a worker to make something for you is not the same thing as paying an artist to spend hours teaching you how to make it.
On top of that, a lot of Malaysians are too focused on the result of making art and not the process. So if, for example, they’re not very good at engraving mugs, they’d rather just buy decent store-bought mugs than learn how to make not-so-good engravings.
“They’re happy to watch people,” Yeoh said, referring to popular arts and crafts videos online, “but when it’s their turn, they say, ‘I have no talent, I cannot’.” To Yeoh, however, art does not have to look good to be worth your time, money and energy. All it needs to be is something you enjoy making.
“You have to try first,” she said. “It’s fine. Just make whatever you like.”
At first, I didn’t think much of what she said. But after I went home and replayed the recording of our interview, I remembered the art room. Someone had written “Nate was here” with maroon paint on one of the walls’ plastic covering and at the time, I’d wanted to take a photo of that.
I changed my mind a few seconds later, though, and I came up with a bunch of excuses to justify my choice: I can’t use it for this article; Yeoh was going to send me higher-quality photos anyway; my phone’s camera is terrible; I’m a writer, not a photographer.
Maybe I should have taken that photo. Whoever Nate was, I’m sure he would have wanted me to do it. And even if the photo had turned out blurry, at least I’d tried first.
JY Tan is a writer whose short stories have appeared in multiple NutMag volumes and hopes to get a novel published someday. When she isn’t selling her soul to pay for her cat son’s food (a.k.a. working a day job), she can be found on her website at jytan.org.