Creativity Lab Report #3: Create, endure, live
Thank you so much to all of you who decided to stay part of our little email community and who took the time to take the survey to help us make these emails better! We appreciate you! :)
We were delighted to find out that the primary interests were food, craftsmanship and nature, which are the three core focuses of our brand! Other ones were Hamaka stories, books and local business highlights. We're on the right track!
As requested in the survey, we'll try to keep things a little short(er), so let's dive right into it!
The show goes on
The NY Times released a very cool article asking 7 questions to 75 artists worldwide about their experience through the pandemic in 2020. There were some interesting and many funny answers showing how we all are more similar than different, no matter our career choices we all live in between our work and personal realities. We also wrote a bogpost on procrastination and the art of being bored, having hobbies and allowing the space to be creative.
Hamaka News: Cookbook Update
In line with the Article above, 2020 gave us space to brew new ideas and channel our energy towards new goals and dreams. One of them, to make another cookbook. We're currently in the planning stages; Chef Shauna is testing and adapting recipes, and we are creating the prop-styling guides and making drafts for each recipe.
Our latest behind-the-scenes videos were all about making backdrops with Dan Versloot from Live Well Build Co. Find the recap blogpost here, with tips to make your own. And watch the three-part series on Youtube.
Pleasing to the soul
Some things that we now take for granted used to be masterpieces of artistry at some point. Technology brought us forward at rapid speeds, but there are still those out there who find fulfillment in preserving traditional practices. Here is a beautiful video featuring David Carruthers from La papeterie Saint-Armand in Montreal, who uses reclaimed fabric to make artisanal paper.
Book: Endure
I, Alieska, celebrated my 35th birthday this year by running 35 km around town. For some, it might sound bananas; for others, it must be peanuts. For me, it was the longest I've run to date but not the longest I hope to run in the future! Birthdays are a celebration of life! So I wanted to celebrate it by doing things that make me feel most alive and thankful for every breath! I wanted to do something uncomfortable but memorable. It was the best birthday EVER!
Endure by Alex Hutchinson presents a summary of athlete stories and research about the limits of the human body, physical and mental, and how we can always find that little “extra” even after we think we're done. These lessons can be applied to the fitness world and also the professional and personal aspects of our lives.
Note: We thought about doing a little experiment this month. Is anyone interested in doing a book swap? We want to pass-on some of the books we’ve already read and start reading new ones. We’ll start with: Sapiens by Yuval Harari, The Book of Dust by Phillip Pullman, Endure by Alex Hutchinson, Wealthing like Rabbits by Robert Brown, Living with a Seal by Jesse Itzler and Company of One by Paul Jarvis. We’ll be interested in books about Fitness and Athletic Performance, Arts and Creativity, Nutrition and Food Science, Food Systems and Farming, Environmentalism and Sustainability. No fiction or novels for now.
Local love
Our good friends Katie and Andrew Brooks from Giftii and Project Carve just moved into a new commercial space! They did the renovations themselves, and their new headquarters are now filled with lots of natural light, unique offerings and much love to share through their gift boxes!
Hamaka Sessions #3: Vida
We are celebrating our Latin roots this month and crafted a playlist with tunes from artists from our home country, Venezuela, and places where we've lived, visited or have friends like Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and Colombia.
These songs can take us out of any dark place, make us sing, cry, dance and feel happy to be alive! There are countless memories associated with each of them, and they are a constant reminder of who we are and where we come from. We’re doing our best to adapt to living in Canada, but we are and always will be latin at heart!
Quote
“We are not nouns; we are verbs. I am not a thing...an actor, a writer...I am a person who does things...I write, I act...and I never know what I'm going to do next. I think you can be imprisoned if you think of yourself as a noun.” – Stephen Fry
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