If you’ve read my last two posts, you’ll know that I am now involved in (yet) another social media website… Polyvore, a community that, in Polyvore’s own words, “disrupts the traditional e-commerce model by giving everyone everywhere a voice in shaping today’s trends and influencing purchases”. I discovered the site shortly after Etsy announced that it was going to take treasuries away (click here to see an old post that explains a bit more about treasuries). Over on Etsy, some of us were mad and some of us were sad, but there were also those who wondered what all the fuss was about.

Well, to some of us, the treasury was more than just a marketing tool; it was an art form. As well as promoting each other’s shops, we did things like A bird in the hand…

…and I Regret Nothing (one of my last treasuries)…

Going Going Gone is one I didn’t make. It was created by a team member in the Flash Mob who made personal treasuries for many of us as a farewell gesture. It features only my art! What an amazing gift. Thank you so much, Donna.

At some point during the final days of treasuries, the Flash Mob discovered Polyvore, a place where treasuries are called ‘sets’ and the old familiar 16-square grid looks more than a little old-fashioned. Now we can edit images, resize them, remove backgrounds, and make really, really creative sets. They can be fairly standard magazine-style editorials about fashion, beauty, or home decor, or they can be quirky and arty and just about anything you want them to be.

Like Etsy, Polyvore is very group and community oriented. There are contests with themes and items to feature, and so it’s surprisingly familiar even as we learn new ways of doing things. My first set was based on the ‘in situ’ illustration I drew for my ‘Moon Over the City’ painting:

Okay, that’s pretty basic, but I’m happy with it and I love being able to style my art in sets. It’s way too much fun (which goes some way to explaining why there hasn’t been a lot of painting going on in the studio this month). Below is an example of a fashion set for an ‘I Love Paris in the Fall’ contest — I couldn’t resist using my autumn tree drawing in the background:

The opportunities for creativity are endless. You can use the images already on Polyvore — and yes, quite a few are sponsored — or you can import your own from any website (like Pinterest, Polyvore preserves the link to the site that the image came from).

I’ll sign off today with a set that has nothing to do with anything, really. It was for a contest that had to feature our “first device love in the Technological Age” and, for me, that was my trusty old tape deck. Thanks for reading.