Does anyone here make an income from their crafts?

[leafling]

I'm considering a reshuffle in my working life, going part time in my reasonably well-paid, 100% 'online' job where I do a lot of emotional labour, to bring in something where I'm offline, using my hands, and nobody wants me to fix their life.

I've recently taken up weaving wall hangings and have found myself daydreaming about making this part of a portfolio career - continuing what I'm currently doing half the time, and then making lots of woven products to sell the rest of the time.

But the little voices in my head are telling me it's crazy and I wouldn't make any money unless I was also teaching / doing lots of social media promotion, which a) I don't love the idea of, and b) I'm nowhere near experienced enough to teach.

So I'm curious to hear experiences of people who have tried and made it some version of 'successful', whatever that means to you...

For what it's worth I'm single and no kids, so no other income to fall back on but also no other mouths to feed...

I make a living from my craft. The thing that is really important is to work out your pricing, and then see if realistically you could sell your items for that price.
So, work out how long one wall hanging takes, work out the hourly rate and how much the materials are. Include tax, NI, pension contribution etc.
Then do a bit of market research. People massively undervalue crafts (crochet and hand knitting are notoriously difficult to make any profit on, for example). Do you have an Open Houses event near you? If you can get involved in one of those, they are a good indication of if your item will sell.

I’ve considered it in the past but I just wouldn’t make a profit. I used to make dresses and loads of people asked me if I’d consider making one for them, happy to pay. But once materials and even minimum wage were considered I’d have been looking at charging £150+ for a simple summer dress (not like a prom dress or something) and people just don’t want to pay that. Probably more, as that was based on making clothes for myself where I know my measurements and adjustments. With a new person I’d have to measure them etc and do any necessary pattern adjustments which would add hours more.

@Thingsthatgo Wise advice! I think this is the tricky part for me, perhaps because I haven't got enough experience to be able to accurately estimate timings... I guess some of it is also finding the balance of choosing a mix of things that will sell easily and can be churned out fairly quickly, plus some bigger-ticket items that might take longer but will turn a greater profit margin.

@modgepodge the effort and materials of handmade works are so underestimated, aren't they? Until you get to some kind of economy of scale, it feels really prohibitive.

It's interesting in that you ask about people make a living from their craft. In that mere statement almost demoting it. And that's part of the problem - people seeing craft as lesser, art as more worthy.

Can you elevate you craft into an art? see on Insta: vanessabarragao_work
She crochets. One of her sculptural wall hangings would set you back thousands

If it's elevated into an art you could work on fewer high value pieces, and not be consumed by making keychains etc

My friend used to. I helped her out with the occasional market. It looked soul destroying to me, women (usually) spending their whole weekend wheeling out their beautiful hand crafted items, and putting it all away again, having made £20. You’d earn more working two hours at Tesco.

I'm not sure I follow your logic that simply asking if someone's making a living from something 'demotes' it.

I made no distinction between the value of an art and the value of a craft, nor was it I who referenced the need to 'elevate' one to the level of another.

My mother was an incredibly talented fine artist with multiple exhibitions in major cities, and she certainly didn't make a living from it.

You don't need to make any decisions for a long time. You could just try selling a few things you've made and see how that works out, without giving up your day job.

I've often had well meaning people telling me I could sell things I make but it's really not worth it once you cover the cost of materials. I would be lucky to make 50p an hour.

As I understood it, it was the use of "craft' rather than 'art.' Someone will pay £££ for original artwork, but will look at hand crafted items (garment, bag, toy etc) and immediately start undervaluing them and comparing the price to what they can get from Primark rather than considering the talent and work that is behind it.