About Us

At Calico Creates we pull from our roots to combine fresh designs with flares of innovation and eco-friendly materials. It has been said that from humble beginnings come great things. Growing up in North Carolina, sisters Heather Washburn and Erin Bartlett would often disappear for hours scavenging for materials around the house to make a variety of toys, forts, and sculptures. As a women owned business, Calico Creates evolved out of the sisters’ desires to repurpose common materials and transform them into beautiful creations.

We follow our passions. Our inspiration can be drawn from many sources with Mother Nature being the greatest. Being a multi-disciplinary studio, this idea applies to all aspects of our design work. We constantly look at diverse cultures and artists from around the world for sparks of inspiration, but ideas can also come from simple things such as recognizing a pattern or liking the different shades of color in a leaf. These inspirations help us to think outside the box and challenge the conventional. However our time in design school taught us that you have to know and understand the rules before you can break them. Through meticulous studies of materials, craft, history and art we developed and fine-tuned a process of rapid design development, prototype testing, and adjustment. In these phases we look at incorporating movement and punches of color that make a statement. Through our design development process we combine visual and tactile strategies to create products that are one-of-a-kind original pieces of art. When our pieces are finally launched and leave the studio they have an eye-catching, show-stopping effect.

We make every effort to push the design envelope to make unique and modern products you won’t see anywhere else. When you look at our collection, including all of our goods and accessories, our sense of color is reflected and translated across every medium. With such a diverse background from all the members of Calico, we continually are able to pull from a rich bank of innovative ideas and execute our designs with compassion.