A few months ago I drew this octopus for the cover of a literary journal and I’ve been trying to figure out what to do with it ever since (aside from the journal…I really like him). So today I found Zazzle and created my own stickers(!). It’s kind of exciting.

And I have to say there are a few interesting trends here…

First is the democracy of design. Anyone can enter into Zazzle (one of many options) and create something (a t-shirt, a mug, your own stamp). Within a few days, the tangible, self-designed object arrives at your door. This is empowering, accessible and fun; in other words, you create your own agency. This trend in design has been happening for some time now as perhaps most prominently evinced through desktop publishing, whereby any human with access to a computer can design her own book, her own papers, her thoughts (see the writing of Ellen Lupton, especially her essay in Looking Closer 5).

In producing these stickers, I worried about the volume of waste/products being produced by a site like Zazzle. Is this just more stuff to be placed in a landfill? Is this a waste of our natural resources? Whose resources, ours or those of another country?

First, Zazzle reports that all of their products are produced in the United States. Good. Further, in thinking about the type of human who would take the time to design a custom shirt, say, and then spend the money to order it (starting at $12.95 plus shipping and sometimes fees, more expensive than many stores), is a human who cares about her products, no? While the problem of waste can be addressed and affected on the local level, the main perpetuators of it are corporations, those that create thousands of things per day (often outsourcing) and simply hope that someone will buy them. In a way, Zazzle empowers the consumer not just to design their material objects but also sends the message to corporations that we want agency, that we are thinking small, that we are individuals.

Maybe this is a rationalization, but I think it actually holds weight. (Aside: Etsy is one step up from Zazzle, in my view, as the site is a space which facilitates the selling of artists’ work, of handcrafted things. So rather than manufacturing, say, a mug, an artist on Etsy has to make the mug herself…Etsy simply provides the forum in which to promote the mug. Hell yes.)

Either way, check out the sticker here and let me know what you think.