We chat to Briony and Simone, two good friends who earlier this year began 'Gin and Tea Club' - a South London company who specialise in beautiful hand crafted cards. We discuss the benefits of working with someone in a creative company and of course, Gin and Tea.
Do you remember the moment you decided to form G&T - what inspired you to start the business?
Like most great stories, it just happened. I have the gin and tea club on the wall in my kitchen and we were both drinking tea one day and talking about expanding Briony's art work into cards and I had been looking to do something crafty and then as they say the rest is history. We thought it would be great fun to collaborate and design cut and draw together.
How do you feel working as a collaboration benefits your practice?
We work very well together, we get on great and it's very easy sharing the work load and leaving jobs for the other. It's been very easy and we have been lucky.
What's the best piece of advice have you been given since starting your company?
To just go for it, you have nothing to lose and to not be shy. Always be confident and proud of your work.
When you're not working on Gin & Tea what do you both do?
Briony works at an artist studio in London and also runs Briony Mullan designs. Simone is a trauma specialist Radiographer in London. We live next door to each other and spend a lot of time together as do our partners which is handy as Briony is my bridesmaid next year and Dave Briony's partner is one of my husband to be's usher.
What's the best piece of advice have you been given since starting your company?
Keep your accounts in check and record all sales and popularity of colours and styles etc.
Tell us about G&Ts plans for the future?
We always want to try and expand into wedding lines of stationary and invites etc. Christmas and valentine's are big days for us so we will be working hard on those.
For the rest of your life, if you had to chose: Gin or Tea?
This is like the ultimate choice, the day starts with tea and ends with gin. I think ultimately tea because it solves anything, but then so does gin......... Gin, no tea, no gin.......
To See more of Gin and Tea Club's work please click here.