brooklyn renegade 2010, part I: fathers' day gift roundup

I've just returned from a successful visit to the Brooklyn Renegade Craft Fair held yesterday and today in McCarren Park in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. My friend Maria and I braved the sweltering heat to go out and support handmade and soak up some of that amazing indie creativity. There were sooooooo many inspiring vendors, that I decided to break it down into two posts.

Since Father's Day is only two weeks away (June 20th), part of my mission was to seek out gift ideas beyond the standard shirt & tie that most Dad's have seen plenty of, and look what I found! I still can't get over how easy it was to find suitable masculine gifts. Since it's too late to run out to the show now, follow the links to the artists' online stores to shop for the daddies in your life.

Shara Porter's booth of screen printed leather goods was Fathers' Day Central. She prints her daddy-friendly images on wallets, card cases, coasters and even reclaimed leather goods.

T-shirts are so much more fun than dress shirts for Dad. Jennie Howard of Handsome Howard shows off her nostalgic Brooklyn water tower t-shirt which is available in her online store along with many other masculine images emblazoned on tees, ties, pillows, and totes. Got this one for my own daddy-o.

More cool daddy-centric t-shirts from Jason Laurits of Paste T-Shirts.

Love this steampunk-style image from Paste.

That Jason's got a dry sense of humor!

For the literary type: recycled book journals from Ex Libris Anonymous.

Couldn't resist this one for my dad.

Interleaved with the acid-free sketch paper are a few pages from the old book it was recycled from. Gotta love 1960's food styling. They had many other manly journals as did Overdue Industries.

Here's something different: blocks of wood with building facades printed on them from Bladon Conner and Eddie Huber of scraptones. These would make excellent desk accessories or library decor, don't you think? My hubby is an architect and would love one of these...

An alternative to the "#1 Dad" mug: hand thrown ceramic tumbler with the image of a noble wolf by Susannah Tisue of SKT Ceramics. She has many other wildlife images available on mugs and tumblers in her Etsy shop and every weekend at Brooklyn Flea.

Too clever: cufflinks made out of vintage typewriter keys by The Weekend Store. They also have cufflinks made out of map snippets.

The mesmerizingly intricate block prints of Tugboat Print Shop would be perfect for art-lover Dad, or even for the dad who doesn't know he loves art yet, but needs to fit out his man-cave or office. I love this fanciful boat image. They also have amazingly detailed map and scenic designs all HAND block printed from HAND-carved plywood blocks. These are original limited edition HAND-pulled prints!

If you get nothing else, you must get a card. A handmade one always seems more thoughtful than one from the drugstore. I couldn't resist the screen-printed underpants card by Gold Teeth Brooklyn. I also got a more sophisticated letterpress card from Sycamore Street Press.

A great selection from Gold Teeth Brooklyn.

These were just a fraction of the 300 vendors exhibiting at the show. Up next: pretty stuff from the Brooklyn Renegade show.