Publicity for a designer is vital to ensure each design reaches the audience to whom it is intended. It is also an essential method of introducing designs to new audiences.

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Research Trips:

In November 2016 I was in East London to see the exhibition of South African artist William Kentridge at the Whitechapel Gallery. I was with my friend Velda Pond, also a print designer. We walked down Brick Lane and then to nearby Spitalfields Market. In Commercial Road we saw two distinguished men walking side by side. We turned to each other and said "Gilbert and George" and ran back to them to say hello. Velda was very keen to take a photograph of them. I decided it would be a good opportunity to talk to them and have a photo taken with these creative legends. It's a good idea to go to art exhibitions frequently as you never know who you might see nearby!

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Guest Speaker:

It was a privilege to be invited as guest speaker to talk about my brand Paisley Power to the Surface Pattern Design Guild, Berkeley, California, US. Jill Turney, a graphic designer from San Francisco, arranged the event. She is on the steering committee of the guild. We first made contact with each other on the business networking website Linkedin in 2014. The event was a big success and the audience was very receptive and welcoming. I talked about my print designs for fashion, furnishing and stationary. I also talked about design commissions I have completed for clients. I was thrilled to be invited back to the guild in March 2017 to talk about the techniques I used to create my designs. The audience were very receptive again, they took notes and said they were very grateful for gaining useful creative skills from my presentation.

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Run a competition:

A great way to engage with your audience is to run a competition. I decided to post a photo every day for 2 weeks, of a celebrity wearing a paisley pattern garment, on my Paisley Power facebook page. I covered the celebrities’ faces with question marks so the viewers had to guess who they were. At the end of the 2 weeks I posted all 14 celebrities together as you can see in the picture opposite. Try and guess who they are without scrolling down to the bottom of the page to see the celebrities faces revealed. I have also added the names of the celebrities at the bottom of this page in case you have trouble guessing any of them.

I ran the competition to encourage people to go to a big festival where i had a stall selling my Paisley power products (see pics). The festival was called Brushfest and was organised by the legendary Pink Toothbrush nightclub in Rayleigh Essex. I gave prizes of cushions, hats and free tickets to the event. Friends and customers really enjoyed playing the competition every day and were keen to win the prizes. They also came up to my stall at the festival and said the competition had been really fun.

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Other Publicity Methods:

Local newspapers, magazines and radio stations familiarise people in your town with your work. Stocking your products in local shops helps to make your neighbourhood aware that they can buy the products 'in person'. This is particularly important with textiles because buyers like to feel the texture of the fabric and check the quality of the workmanship.

National TV coverage is not affordable for most self-employed designers. We have agents who sell our designs and we can also build up our own portfolio of clients. We try to attract new clients without the expense of national advertising. A small picture advertisement in a national magazine can cost thousands of pounds.

Networking is a great way to publicise a designer's work. Social media and a personal website are important for sharing work but meeting people in person has a much more lasting relationship. You can usually find ways of mutually publicising each other by introducing the other person's work to your audience and vice versa.

Exhibitions are also a great way for the public to appreciate your work in a relaxed setting. At the Essex Open Exhibition 2015 (pic 1), at the Beecroft Art Gallery, Southend, Essex, UK approximately 130 works by different artists were selected. Each artist is likely to invite friends and family to see the show and most of the artists and art lovers in the town and possibly in the county of Essex will come. They will appreciate the wide variety of paintings, photography, 3D, print and mixed media. Cash prizes are awarded in different fields by local businesses who sponsor the awards. It was the first time I had submitted one of my designs for the exhibition so I was pleased to be included and to meet other artists and photographers at the private view. The exhibition is organised by Southend Museums

On 23rd October 2015 I went to a lecture at The Liberty in Fashion exhibition at the Fashion and Textile Museum, London. The talk was by the Managing Director of Liberty London, Ed Burstell. It was a pleasure to hear about his career in fashion retail and to chat to him in person. Check out his new autobiography "At Liberty" published by Michael O'Mara Books Limited in 2015.

I was contacted by Jamie Lowe, assistant editor of WhereTraveler.com in May 2016 and invited to be interviewed about paisley fabric. Where Traveler is the online version of Where travel magazine, one of the highest circulation magazines in US. I answered questions about the origin and meaning of the paisley symbol, buying paisley shawls, quality of paisley textiles and where to buy paisley fabrics now. The article is titled Traveling by Cloth: Beautiful Textiles From Around the World. In addition to the section about paisley, there are sections covering a variety of other fabrcis including Scottish tartan, Japanese kimonos, Cambodian Ikats, Turkish/ Persian Rugs, Native American Navajo Rugs, Uzbekistan Suzani, Ghanaian Kente cloth , Indian Khadi, Bangladeshi Kantha Quilt, Irish Linen and Icelandic Lopapeysa Sweaters. If you are interested in textiles from around the world, you will find this article very interesting. It has some beautiful illustrations including a photo of exquisite paisley silk. It was very kind of Jamie to include a link to my website PaisleyPower.com. She will also be sending me a print edition of their syndicated newspaper pages. Their July newsletter featuring the article will be sent to all subscribers. One of the best ways to gain new viewers to a website is to have editorial links in major publications, so i am extremely pleased about the publicity my website will receive from the paisley article.

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Pics:

Patrick Moriarty with famous artists Gilbert and George.

Patrick Moriarty interview in Where Traveler online.

Patrick Moriarty guest speaker in California 2016.

Paisley Power competition.

My Butterfly print in Essex Open Art Exhibition.

Kerry Baker-Davis and Patrick Moriarty in 'March Hares & Monkeys Uncles' shop.

Brushfest Music Festival photo by P Moriarty.

Museumnacht Poster + Elephant screen-print.

TV producer/cameraman at Oxford Street Fair.

Westcliff designer - article in Echo newspaper.

Paisley Power bag featured in 'Live Shop Eat' magazine, (part of interview pictured only)

Patrick Moriarty & Ed Burstell at Liberty in Fashion exhib.

Paisley Power competition - faces revealed.

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Here are the names of the celebrities in the Paisley Power competition:

Prince, Debbie Harry, Stella McCartney, Leonard Nimoy, Florence Welch, Sinead O'Connor, Bruce Springsteen, Alice Cooper, Serge Gainsbourg & Jane Birkin, Mick Jagger, Miley Cyrus, Chuck Berry, Beck, Angelica Houston.

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