06 October 2013

Festival Vendor - Regina Marzlin, Antigonish, Nova Scotai


Five years ago as newcomer Regina Marzlin walked the beautiful beaches in Nova Scotia, she began collecting sea glass. Gradually her whole family joined her in this obsession! As they collected, she began to see ways to combine her fibre art with the glass they found. Some of Regina’s best selling articles are fabric postcards and small wearable art and after some trial pieces, she successfully developed a way to meld fabric and glass and began to sell her new designs locally.

2013 was the 5th anniversary of the Mermaid’s Tears Sea glass Festival in Souris, PEI, a charming little coastal town with great beaches. This three day event is held on the fourth weekend in July at the Souris Lighthouse with vendors, lectures, shard contests and demonstrations. This was Regina’s first year as a vendor and knowing that most artists use sea glass in jewelry or decorative art pieces, and knowing that what she was doing was new and different, she made a number of larger pieces, some framed fabric collages and lots of postcards and pins.

The festival takes place in a large tent so Regina hung some of her larger pieces from the tent structure near her display table. She found festival goers were quite interested in her work and she received a lot of great feedback. Over and over she heard, “I have never seen anything like that!”

Regina really enjoyed talking with the other vendors, getting to see the amazing sea glass finds and chatting with all the visitors who were interested in her work. Solid media coverage (including a piece by CTV for the local news) and strong attendance helped make the show financially successful for Regina. She will definitely be returning to next year’s festival with many new designs she is inspired to create!







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