Sandy Bay Creations develops from friends' mutual interests

A shared interest in creative arts led two long-time friends to develop a business that would showcase their talents. The end result of this collaboration was the birth of Sandy Bay Creations. The venture has led its owners to various arts and crafts shows around the region. For the past three years, they have been participants in the Poplar Head Farmers Market, which combines artisans and food producers in an open-air market.

Carol Sparks, of DeFuniak Springs, Fla., and Patsy Stephens, of Paxton, Fla., have, through the years, developed a wide range of products – knitted items, hand-milled soap and jewelry, to name a few. But it has been in the past three years that they turned their mutual interests into a business. As with most of what they do, the name was a personal creation.

“I live on a road that has ‘Sandy’ in its name,” Stephens said. “I used to live on a road with ‘Bay’ in its name,” added Sparks. “We liked the name because it represents something serene and beautiful,” Stephens said. “And, we didn’t want to put our names out there,” Sparks said.

Once the name was chosen, the duo turned their skills into creating a business that would provide unique creations that would appeal to a wide audience, particularly for those that attend events like farmers markets and craft shows.

“We’re a business now,” Sparks said, “but we’ve been doing this a long time as a hobby. We felt it was time to put the hobby into a business. We create things as the creative spirit moves us. Sometimes, we also do it on a commission.”

During Saturday morning’s market, both were knitting items for their business. Even though both love to knit, they approach the process differently. Sparks knits the traditional way – with needles. Stephens knits using a loom.

“We like to do unusual things,” Sparks continued. “Patsy does blown-glass necklaces (in addition to knitting). I work with wire and make choker-bead necklaces. We like to play with our work. While doing what we do, we both have a whole lot of fun. We like to create something that is beautiful and useful as well.

“In our jewelry, we know people want something that is beautiful. At the same time, they don’t want it to be costly for them to purchase. We take that into consideration. We use things that are not that expensive, but they are beautiful. We like to work with art glass, semi-precious stones and fun beads. We use a lot of techniques, like knitted wire, that are unusual. We also look for new items to use. A lot of companies have come out with some really beautiful fibers that we like to use.

“Patsy has made a lot of necklaces that she looms. She creates beautiful necklaces out of it.”

The development of their hand-milled soap is an addition to their line of creative products.

“We’ve learned about hand-milled soap from reading a couple of books and also from information found on the Internet,” Stephens said. “It’s also called French-milled soap. We take soap that has already been created and re-mill it. You add your own smells and oils to it. You can put it into different molds for different shapes. All of our soaps are hypoallergenic.”

In summing up their business model, Sparks stated, “We try to keep it inexpensive. We want our work to be fun, unique, useful and affordable.”

For more information about Sandy Bay Creations, visit www.sandbaycreations.etsy.com, or send an email to lorac1776@hotmail.com, or call 1-850-892-7061.