One of the first products on my online store will be the Tutti Putti Sticker Set. I've been psyched to show off these winged cuties for more than a year now ...
... though I won’t be selling my soul to the promo demon for them just yet!
Instead, I wanted to share what I've been doing during this time around my local stomping ground.
Since the plague hit us early last year, my favourite way to decompress has been doing the essential travel thing on my electric scooter and going for jaunts around the neighbourhood. It's a bit dystopic, sure, but it's hella fun!
As an artist and Inner West local, I've always felt somewhat of a civic duty to contribute to the ever-growing crust of stickers and paste-ups around the place. Whether it's one of the many telephone poles in Newtown or the mailbox of another yet-to-be-gentrified warehouse, I've been excited to leave my mark.
Combining the two, my late-night zooms around the block have given me a lot more than an adrenaline rush. With my stickers in tow, taking the long way home is always a creative pleasure!
If you're interested in making some stickers of your own, here's a few design tips to help:
Use a high quality and waterproof material
Paper stickers are cheap and all, but unless you're planning on them quickly being reclaimed by nature, it's best to use something weatherproof like a PVC-free vinyl.
The colours are rich, vibrant, and long-lasting
It's scratch resistant and weather-proof (take that, Mother!)
There's no air bubbles.
It's easy to place on many different textures and surfaces (though do try and wipe down the area before sticking, if you can)
I repeat, NO AIR BUBBLES.
Even if you're on a dime, there's plenty of Aussie printers that offer affordable vinyl options, like Radstickers and OzStickerPrinting.
If you can't afford to get a professional printer involved, that's fine too! As much as we like to dunk on wikiHow, this article has some pretty cool tips on how to make your own quality durable stickers at home (sadly no warped instructional cartoons though).
Being exposed to the elements never looked so good!
Consider your audience and the flow of traffic
So there's a few points to this one, most of which come down to your intentions. Besides the usual fun of sticking wherever you go, what's your sticker designed to do? Promote, engage, shock, inspire, provoke, humour, awe, or all of the above? Any of these are fine, but your answer will more than likely affect where you'll choose to stick it to (pun intended).
Do you want your sticker to be looked at constantly or subtly meet the eye-lines of passersby? Do you want it to be in a discreet location or smack bang in the middle of everything? Regardless of whether or not you're looking to ruffle feathers, placement of your stickers can be important to how they're received.
If you're trying to avoid unwanted attention, try to find areas where there are already signs of sticker life. While being a lone ranger on a church wall sounds great and all, if an area has the resources to spend on something like sticker and graffiti removal, they're unfortunately more than likely the sort to take legal action too. Just be mindful, is all!
Add a website/handle/tag/stripper-name/whatever
This one is optional, of course! If you're political posting, identifying yourself is probably the last thing you want to do (even if it's just a link your anime profile pic burner account).
I'd be lying if I said this point wasn't entirely due to personal experience, though. There's been so many times where I've found an awesome sticker or poster and haven't had a clue where to find who made it!
Beyond recognition, though, there's also just a lot of potential for others to engage with it. One benefit to living in the dystopic digital age is being able to live in our emotional, physical, and online environments simultaneously. Why not take advantage of that? I'm sure politicians would be far more humbled by stickers of their faces next to shortened zentai porn site links than insults.
Be safe, stupid!
Look, we all love a poster, sticker, or throw-up that makes you think "damn, how'd they get up there?" But is it really worth breaking your legs for?
If you're gonna make an elusive contribution to the public stairwell and don't want your sticker to be accompanied by a chalk outline, try to be safe about it and use ladders or protective gear if necessary.
Beyond injuring yourself, you've also gotta make sure your stickers won't cause harm to others too! If you're working with metallic foils or reflective materials, pedestrian only areas and structures facing away from roads and bike paths are the safest way to go.
While it's nice to think our art is capable of stopping traffic, it's probably not a good idea to do it literally!
And that's it!
It's certainly not an exhaustive guide, but I hope this helps you on your sticker journey all the same. With the streets as your canvas, there are so many ways to experiment and have fun with it!
I've still got so many ideas and plans for stickers in the future (for both Bad Habit and my own satisfaction). While most of these bombs have been hardly "explosive", I'm keen to get more experimental with it.
Happy sticker-ing!
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