2013 was a pivotal year for B3. We celebrated our 10th anniversary and experienced the challenges that come with making the leap to the next level as a business. Truthfully, it wasn’t always easy. Sometimes, it was downright hard–remember when our building’s plumbing had to be completely redone? Oy. Through it all, however, our team remained steadfast in its effort to keep B3 a great place to be and a business our customers can be proud of.
We hope you enjoy this look back at some of our biggest moments of 2013. Share your favorite B3 and chainmaille moments of the year in the comments below. Here’s a toast to 2014!
We moved. Whoa.
By far the BIGGEST moment of the year–and maybe even of B3’s history–is that we moved to our new space in Edgewater, allowing us ample room to work, store product and ultimately open our first retail location. It wasn’t easy, but looking back we can hardly remember being cramped in our old space. We barely know how we managed to do everything we did in there!
We celebrated our multi-talented team.
For Valentine’s Day, our team shared love notes to some of our favorite projects and crafts. The result demonstrates just how creative our group really is.
We launched our CRE8TIME Maker Studio for National Craft Month.
In March, we launched our CRE8TIME Maker Studios, just in time for National Craft Month. We opened our space to makers of all kinds and had a great time creating together.
We celebrated creative moms.
In May, we organized a blog hop to celebrate creative moms and women in honor of Mother’s Day. The posts honored all kinds of crafty ladies–including Rebeca’s mom Rita (who tried her hand at chainmaille for the first time!)
We had a great time at the Bead&Button Show!
We always love seeing regulars and meeting new addicts…er…chainmaillers *wink* at the Bead&Button Show and 2013 was no different. Also, Rebeca’s Chainmaille Mandala winning the Bead Dreams People’s Choice Award was super-exciting!
We worked with furry friends.
It’s no secret that the B3 team is a big bunch of animal lovers. Nearly everyone has at least one furry family member–and some have several. With our new larger space, we decided to participate in Bring Your Dog to Work Day and had two fuzzy co-workers for the day. Too much fun!
We opened a Pop-Up Shop.
After dealing with months of red tape and delays, we took matters into our own hands and opened a Pop-Up version of our space, working with what we had. We didn’t have a floor, but our creative retail team still managed to make the place look pretty great. We had visitors from as far away as New York and Texas!
We honored a great chainmaille supporter.
In September, we learned of the passing of a woman named Genie Jackson, who, in addition to being a kind and uplifting soul, had been an incredible supporter of our craft. We honored her with a blog post, sharing some of the ways she had contributed to the growth of our art form. She was an inspiring person and we think of her often.
We had a Grand Opening Party!
In October, we finally celebrated the opening of our retail space and had a great night partying with close friends and making new ones. We made Make & Take projects, ate cake pops and admired epic chainmaille couture. It was a total blast. We wish we could have a Grand Opening every month!
We met Oscar the Knight.
In October, we challenged you to create chainmaille costumes for your pets and got some of the cutest contest entries ever! The winner was Oscar the Knight, and his person was awarded a $100 B3 Gift Certificate. We think Oscar’s reward was probably not having to wear his costume again (at least until next year).
We celebrated CHAINED’s 3rd anniversary.
Three years and 35,000 copies later, Rebeca’s book CHAINED continues to inspire new maillers everywhere! We took a moment to honor this big anniversary in November and are happy to announce that Rebeca is now working on her long-awaited second book!
We rode the CTA.
Well, we do that all the time actually–but not usually in the form of a super-fancy ad! We ran our first CTA ad on the red line in November (which, conveniently, stops just steps from our front door). We have to admit, it’s been pretty exciting to see these shining faces when we travel to and from work.
We got a floor.
This might not sound that exciting, but after for waiting nearly a year to be able to really complete our space, seeing this beautiful floor installed was a huge moment for us. It felt like a big fat reward for all our hard work and we are loving the elegance it lends to our store. *swoon*
We won “Best New Edgewater Business.”
After all the ups and downs of the year, it was pretty great to end on a high note! With your help, we were voted “Best New Edgewater Business.” In 2014, we look forward to doing even more for our neighborhood in an effort to achieve our mission of being a center for creativity in Chicago.
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