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"The idea came to us (my wife Lyuba and myself) in January 2011. We were at a kind of a life’s crossroad deciding whether we should just go find a job or try something on our own. Lyuba had a good taste in design and was always browsing the ideas. I had a chance to study modeling and sewing clothes and used to make coats for my friends for a couple of years, almost as a hobby. So Lyuba said “bags”. Because it’s simpler than coats and everyone needs to have one, more than one, actually. And she said “wool felt”. She saw felt bags on the web and they were eye-catching. And we both thought that the existing bags are boring and we need to create something crazy and fun. So the next day we found a wool felt supplier, borrowed a sewing machine from a friend and started to experiment. We had many crazy ideas but it was actually the wool felt’s amazing modeling qualities that grounded the “bags-objects” idea. And we just made the Dirigible bag and it was stunning. We had a piece of felt left so we made the Milk Can bag and it also looked so good. We were really surprised ourselves by how mind-blowing these bags-objects were in reality! But it would really mean nothing if others didn’t like it, because we had to make it a little family business. So we took pictures, put those two models on the web and… it worked! The next two or three months we were making Dirigibles and Milk Cans non-stop."
"When we decided on the bags-objects direction, the ideas scope was defined also by technological limitations. We wrote down a huge list of models that we could possibly create and made sketches of some of them but we didn’t have time for all of them and didn’t have a reference point of which one to make next. And then people started asking us if we could make a certain bag! Those first two bags just showed people what’s possible and since then, in most cases it was their choice which model from our list would come next."
"We started with wool felt. It’s an amazing material, easy to model and it looks just great. Yet some people thought it’s not as practical (especially for bags) as leather/faux leather. Working with leather required changing technology, buying a heavy industrial sewing machine, redoing patterns, so we were unable to switch to leather all at once. The transition was kind of natural with new leather models replacing wool felt one at a time. And we still have some wool felt models listed in our shop. But if someone orders it we suggest making it leather instead. Usually it takes a day or two to create patterns for a new model. But sometimes it may take months, like it did with the Wings backpack. We made several 2-3 day attempts in a year-long period before it actually worked. It takes from 4 to 12 hours approximately to make a bag depending on the model."
"Our consumer audience are people with youthful hearts. The real age ranges from kids to grandmas. A part of the audience are cosplayers or fans of something. But the big part are just people who love to have fun and to make others happy.
The most common feedback is about other people’s reaction. Our customers told us many times how much attention and compliments they receive when wearing our bags. Other people stop them on the streets to ask about a bag or take a picture or just give nice comments. One should be prepared for that when buying our bags! We thought our bags are a great conversation starter."
"We are super busy (as always) working on the orders but we have some new ideas for the backpacks to work on in the near future. First of all, we hope to create a Fly backpack using the same technology we just recently discovered and used in the Fairy Wings backpack. Other ideas are a Stag Beetle backpack, a different design of a Fish bag and maybe a Typewriter bag. But it all depends on how busy we’d be."
"Lyuba used to draw (mostly portraits) since she was a child, although she never studied arts, just had a natural taste in design and beauty. She was already a “handmade” artist before we started KrukruStudio - she was making very nice wool beads.
I studied physics in the university and worked for a few years as an engineer on a railway - but at the same time I played in a rock band. Music is my passion from childhood. Once I had a chance to wear 19th-century-style theater costumes and I immediately thought “I want to make something like that”. So I took courses in designing and making clothes. So it all brought us to creating these bags."
"The most fun part is always to see a new model just made. Even now, when we are kind of worn down a bit after 11 years of work - to see a new thing that no one ever did before. The fun and nice reviews from our customers are also a very nice part. The most frustrating… I think is the routine. The longer we work - the more we are bound to the routine of running the business, the less time we have for creativity. But we’ll certainly go on!"
