Shopping at 1890 Bryant Street Studios
This holiday season, an artist’s building is opening its doors to the public.
Ye Old Mayonnaise Factory
1890 Bryant Street Studios is a building in the Inner Mission which houses over 80 artists. Because of things like the smell of turpentine and the need for good lighting, not to mention the mental and emotional aspects of making art, artists need studio space. Having a little community can help an artist thrive.
The building itself is a Vera Cort building. This is one of those “if you know, you know” names to drop. It’s been practicing open studio time for years. The neighborhood was home to Hamm’s Brewing, an old Twinkies factory that’s now a U-Haul, and of course a mayonnaise factory. Now mayo maker no more, the building’s artists provide art-lovers with their own variety of condiments with which to flavor their home decor.
The Backstory
Jewelry maker Peggy Li is an artist in the building (studio #417) who also volunteers to help with PR outreach for the events. According to Li, “the resident artists come together every Fall, Holiday and Spring to organize Open Studios and open our doors to the public to give folks a first-hand look where art is created.” They also invite guest artists to fill in any open spaces.
There are, of course, challenges. Li explains, “Our building runs on volunteer effort.” There’s no overarching management of the building since it’s an art collective. “There is definitely a bit of push and pull that goes on, whether it is on fundamentals like what it means to be a working artist vs the challenges of managing a budget,” says Li. But this flexibility is also what keeps studio space affordable as it becomes increasingly hard to be a working artist in San Francisco.
New Perspectives
As a jewelry maker, Li says, “I don’t consider myself a “fine artist” per se, so I think I have a bit of perspective that other artists in the building don’t have.” The variety of art styles and types makes it fun. Many artists are long time professionals, with work exhibited around the globe as well as recently at the deYoung Open. But there are also scrappy new artists.
Problems in the Post Pandemic Period
1890 Bryant St Studios has made this annual, which means they have great insight into what things have been like in the post-pandemic recovery period for artists in SF. Li describes an increase in competing events over the weekend that may lead to the lower foot traffic. The Fall Open Studios, done in conjunction with ArtSpan, was on the same weekend as Folsom St. Fair and the burgeoning Portola Music Festival. As many event organizers know, there’s such a glut of programming that the market has become saturated. There’s never a lack of things to do in The City, and that might be part of the problem.
New Solutions
One remedy the studio has found is drawing more visitors in by offering live demos and other ways for people to get hands-on with the art. And in the future, they may do seminars that help people looking to get into art collection or even create partnerships with other art collectives in the neighborhood to boost awareness. They’ve made it this long by being creative, something that artists tend to be great at.
“For my part,” Li ends, “What I’d like people to know is that 1890 Bryant is an amazing building where artists work that will be opening their doors this coming weekend. Not only do you get to visit the spaces where artists work, but you may meet the artists themselves and get the scoop on incredible works of art directly from the creators.”
This weekend, the holiday opening will allow visitors to see (and buy) local art. The holiday extravaganza is Saturday and Sunday, December 14th and 15th, from noon to 5pm.
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