Sometimes creative writing does more than help me tell a story. Sometimes it helps me see the story I am already living. Lately, writing poetry, blog posts, artist statements, and stories about my textile practice has led me to reconsider how I have organized my small business. The more I write, the more I recognize the threads connecting the different parts of my work. I am an artist. I am a teaching artist. I am an Internet Technologies consultant. I am a writer and storyteller.

For a while, I thought I needed a separate business identity to hold each part of this work. Creative writing is helping me understand something simpler: these aren’t separate lives. They are different expressions of the work I have been building for years. So I am reorganizing my business around the name that already represents what I do professionally: Carola Jones, Teaching Artist LLC.

Starting With What Already Exists

Carola Jones, Teaching Artist already exists as my business and has its own EIN. My next step is to organize the business as Carola Jones, Teaching Artist LLC. That change gives me a clearer umbrella under which to do my work. Under Carola Jones, Teaching Artist LLC, I can teach fiber arts to young people and adults. I can consult with small business owners about Internet Technologies. I can write and publish. I can create videos. And I can make and sell my textile work.

Instead of creating a business structure that separates all these things, I am building one that recognizes how much they depend upon one another. The thread running through it all is teaching. Sometimes I teach with a sewing machine. Sometimes I teach with indigo. Sometimes I teach someone how to build a website. Sometimes I teach by telling a story. And sometimes I teach simply by allowing people to watch my hands work.

Fiber Art by Carola: The Brand of What I Make

Fiber Art by Carola will operate as a DBA of Carola Jones, Teaching Artist LLC. This is an important distinction for me because Fiber Art by Carola isn’t everything I do. It is the brand of what I make and sell. Fiber Art by Carola is where my one-of-a-kind Indigenous Geechee designs become tangible objects. This is where cloth becomes medicine cloth.

My work incorporates natural dyes, indigo, stitching, quilting, crochet, embellishments, reclaimed materials, and designs that carry stories connected to family, land, water, memory, and cultural traditions. These aren’t factory-produced collections designed around quantity. The value is in their individuality.

A piece may begin with a length of cloth placed into an indigo vat. Another may begin with an old garment waiting to become something new. A ribbon from my mother’s stash, a button, a bead, a piece of hand-dyed fabric, or a stitched pattern may become part of its story. Fiber Art by Carola gives those objects a home. Carola Jones, Teaching Artist LLC is the business. Fiber Art by Carola is the brand. That simple sentence has helped me rethink my entire business plan.

Stitching Culture Becomes the Story

Then there is Stitching Culture. One of the biggest discoveries I’ve made through creative writing is that Stitching Culture doesn’t have to become another company. It can become something much more interesting. Stitching Culture is my book and studio at the historic Mercy Hospital Building where I was born. It is where I document the stories behind the making.

The book allows me to write about cloth, memory, family, cultural knowledge, natural dyeing, stitching, and the experiences that shaped my creative practice. A finished piece might be sold through Fiber Art by Carola. But the process of making it (the dye pot, the stitching, the mistakes, the memories, the research, the stories, and the lessons learned) can become part of Stitching Culture. That creates a beautiful cycle: I research. I remember. I write. I make. I teach. I document. I sell. Then I write again. Each activity feeds the next.