There are many creative people in Taiwan. The Tianmu Marketplace and the Red House in Ximen-ding are the two major art and craft markets in Taipei City and good places for people to go treasure hunting on the weekends.
Unique, hand-made products such as Japanese-style slippers, silver accessories for pets, hand-painted helmets, handbags, leather decorations and earrings can only be found in these art and craft markets.
In recent years, art and craft markets have sprung up all over the nation, but not many people have managed to survive due to fierce competition. Apart from selling hand-made creations, the concept of “I have a dream” was one of the best selling products in these markets.
“I set up a stall to sell things because I want everybody to know that it’s not difficult to do what you like to do,” said Asa. After graduating from medical school, Asa painted at the Tianmu Marketplace. She said that many people have things they want to do or like to do, but end up doing what they don’t like to do in order to make a living. “I want to let everybody know that it’s not that difficult to take the first step,” she said.
Asa has liked painting ever since her childhood, but her family could not afford for her to learn painting and also did not think that she could make a career out of it. As she was not interested in being a doctor, Asa taught herself painting and started to sell her works at the Tianmu Marketplace last September. With “Paint on Demand” as her slogan, she does not need to sketch before painting a picture and it takes her 10 to 15 minutes to finish one painting. She can design and paint custom-made pictures for customers on things like hats, helmets, canvas shoes, masks, pencil cases and notepads. She said that most of her customers like her to draw a caricature of their faces.
Joanne, a novice in the art and craft scene, said that designers of hand-made goods all have the same worry. They feel down in the dumps when they get few orders, but they have to work hard to catch up with their work and even stay up late every day when they have too many orders. Even though they enjoy selling things in a market, they all hope that one day they will have their own stores.
While it is great to have a dream, creative designers all worry the most about their ideas being stolen. 17-year-old Lai Yu-chan said that silver accessories were most easily copied. Lai and her elder sister sold creative silver accessories on the Internet before, but because their silver products were sold at a high price, many factories copied their design patterns, mass-produced the same products and then sold them for a low price. After a while, they felt that hand-made products could not compete with mass-produced ones and because of this they started to sell products with fabric-covered buttons instead.
“But I still believe that creativity is something that cannot be replaced” said Lai, adding that customers who purchase creative products don’t like mass-produced products. They have unique judgment and appreciation abilities and this is why creativity will continue to survive, she said.
(LIBERTY TIMES, TRANSLATED BY THEODORE YANG)
台灣創意人才濟濟，台北市天母生活市集及西門町紅樓，是台北市兩大創意市集平台，也是民眾週末挖寶的好去處。
手工日式拖鞋、寵物銀飾、手繪安全帽、手工包包、手工皮飾、手工耳環等，這些強調「獨一無二」、「純手工」的商品只有在創意市集才買得到。
近幾年創意市集蓬勃發展，但能在激烈競爭下生存的人並不多，除了販售手工創作品外，「我有一個夢」也是他們的熱賣商品。
「出來擺攤,要讓大家知道做自己喜歡的事情並不難。」Asa醫學院畢業後，反而到天母市集擺攤畫畫，她認為，很多人都有想做、喜歡做的事情，卻為了生計做著自己不喜歡的工作，「我要讓大家知道踏出那一步沒那麼困難」。
Asa從小就喜歡繪畫塗鴉，但家境因素沒錢讓她學畫，也不認為繪畫可以變成職業，對從醫沒興趣，自己摸索學繪畫，去年九月起開始到天母市集擺攤,以「現點現畫」為號召，不打草稿、直接作畫，十到十五分鐘可以作畫完畢，包括帽子、安全帽、帆布鞋、口罩、筆袋與筆記本等，都可以客制化畫上消費者喜歡的圖案；Asa說，「大部分客人都喜歡畫上自己Q版的臉」。
創意市集的新人Joanne則說，手工創意者都有一樣的煩惱，訂單太少時很失落、很窮，但訂單太多時，手工趕工十分辛苦，天天要熬夜，而且儘管大家擺攤很開心，最終還是希望有自己的店。
雖然有夢最美，但創意者最擔心創意點子被剽竊，十七歲的賴鈺嬋說，銀飾品最容易被抄襲，她之前與姊姊在網站上販售創意銀飾品，但銀飾高單價，引發許多工廠抄襲他們設計的圖案，然後大量生產、低價販售，手工終究拚不贏工廠，才改賣包扣商品。
「不過，我依舊相信只有創意才能長久。」賴鈺嬋說，會選擇創意商品的消費者，就是不喜歡大量生產的工廠商品，他們有獨特的判斷力與鑑賞力，因此，創意才能不死。
（自由時報記者林秀姿）
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