Inspiration

Recapitulation, a practice used by an ancient warrior tribe in Mexico, is the act of replenishing lost energy to oneself. Today,  recapitulation is a meditation practice where, at the end of the day, you wind down by thinking in under 5 minutes all you did in that day.  It’s a little bit of time to decompress, be mindful and feel your accomplishments. Well, what about applying it to an entire year?

The world moves so fast that it’s easy to get buried by the details, the emails. In thinking about 2016, we want to take stock of 2015. What did we accomplish, what do we want to do more of, what do we want to do differently, who do we want to work with?

“I think looking back at the year for anyone is empowering and keeps you going,” Ed says. “So this exercise of recapitulation is key.

As a small business owner, you wear many hats and are often overwhelmed and this exercise allows me to feel successful and energized for 2016.”

A few Stencil 1 2015 highlights:

February was a boon when we were awarded Product of the Year for our repeat pattern wallpaper stencil kit. It’s a consumer-voted award, which felt extra gratifying.

Ed continues, “Events always feel great, since we tend to work in a bubble most the time.” (Speaking of our bubble, it just got a beautiful new makeover a la The Container Store, pics and story to come soon!)

“Seeing people embrace creativity keeps me going.” Last year, Stencil 1 participated in a variety of celebrations: Clarks Shoes’ 65^th anniversary of their desert boot, a pop-up shop at Le Bon Marche in Paris, a community mural at the Brooklyn Museum for their show, Art Off the Wall: The Rise of Sneaker Culture, and a personalized T-shirt event with kids and teens in Miami at the Soho Beach House.

“I think the exercise in looking back and writing a list of your accomplishments, well, it gives you a boost for the year ahead and also reminds you of why you do what you do,” Ed says. “I design stencils and other creative tools to empower people with creativity and hopefully make them happier in some way.”

So what about you? We’d love to make this area of Stencil 1 a conversation space. Let us know what you’d like to see more of? What kinds of projects are you looking to do? How can we assist? We’ll be thinking of you in our daily recapitulation.

I have a crush on a new company, it’s called Devine Color. The creative behind the brand is Gretchen Schauffler and her story of creating the line is an inspiring one ( find out more about Gretchen on her blog). Her twitter username is WhatUpG  – I’m a little obsessed with her down to earth style and humor. With her years of being a color consultant and doing work for thousands, she wanted to simplify the process and make it easier to find the perfect color for your surroundings. Devine Color was born.

Devine Color’s uniquely designed color cards have a cutout window in them with several color swatches around the frame. This allows you to compare and contrast different shades in the room with the colors on the card. As you look through the window, the shade that works the best almost pops out from the color card! It’s almost as if the colors chooses you. You have to see it to actually believe it – in the picture below, we were trying to find a color that compliments the wall behind the sofa the most, and Devine Cocoa immediately stood out from the color card! Personally I think Devine Café and Devine Bavarian would also accommodate the sofa.

The colors that Devine Color offers are fool-proof. I want to utilize the system to come up with colors for stencil installations. I often paint with a tone on tone look so choosing two colors from the card to coordinate in your space, now we’re talking. And not only it’s low odor and zero VOC, but it also has an exclusive illuminating formula that allows true, rich, and radiant color to shine through.

Checkout Divine Color paint at Target. The line also offers modern, removable wallpaper and is also expanding into new offerings.