by Philo Hagen
March 8, 2012 in Hoop-Making, Tutorials
In the second part of a series, Droo Martin of Superhooper.org, with enthusiastic assistance from Navi, teaches us how to measure and cut your tubing. They live in Winona, Texas, USA. Wait, you missed part one? It’s over here.
by Philo Hagen
March 7, 2012 in Features, Hoop-Making
[Hooping.org's Editor Philo Hagen on the value of hoop making.]
by Philo Hagen
The other day I was listening to a hooper rant that all hoops should be free for everyone, that those who make and sell them for $40 are ripping people off. It’s not the first time I’ve heard such a thing. While my first hoop was given to me for fun and for free by a happy hooping hippie on a mission of spreading the hoop love, not all of us can afford to be so financially feckless with our favorite avocation, at least for the long term. After making and giving away scores and scores of hoops myself in my attempt to pay it forward, it dawned on me one day that gifting hoops was making quite a serious dent in my already thin wallet. And inevitably I decided, as so many of us do, that perhaps hoop making itself could be a smart way to supplement my otherwise meager income. I was making hoops anyway, why not get paid for it? And I thought of a sure fire way to get a jump on the competition too. I would sell my hoops for less. After all, who doesn’t want to spend less? The thing I never really took into consideration though was how much it actually costs to make a hoop.
While there are those out there, like my ranting friend, who figure the cost of a hoop to be somewhere around a buck, the real price tag for making a hoop can be quite a different story. For starters, standard polyethylene tubing comes in cumbersome and rather heavy 100 foot rolls, or larger. You have to get somewhere that you can buy the stuff for starters, and you need to pull into the parking lot in a roomy enough vehicle to bring a few of those routinely dirty rolls back with you or the price of the gas is hardly worth it. During my brief stint as a hoop making entrepreneur I regularly drove 45 miles each way, from San Francisco to Livermore, just to buy my pipe. Chances are you’re going to have to travel too, since most cities don’t make a habit of selling farming irrigation tubing where there aren’t, y’know, any farms. And while you might be able to score a roll online for $30, if you wind up paying $35 to have it shipped to you that’s hardly a bargain either. Connectors aren’t terribly expensive, but a sander to grind of the edges can be. A good PVC pipe cutter will also set you back another $20. Anyone who has ever purchased hoop tape knows how quickly a few rolls can really add up too. If you want to have a good selection for people to choose from, then you’re definitely making an investment. Read the rest of this entry →
by Philo Hagen
February 20, 2012 in Hoop-Making, Tutorials
In the first part of a series, Droo Martin of Superhooper.org, with enthusiastic assistance from Navi, teaches us how to prep clear tubing for hoop making. They live in Winona, Texas, USA.
by Philo Hagen
January 4, 2012 in Europe, Fire, Hoop-Making
Eva, aka The Blue Tornado, explains how she made her awesome fire hoop, which is different than the ones we usually see. She lives in Northern Austria.
by Philo Hagen
December 21, 2011 in Hoop-Making, Tutorials
Sarah “Swift Hoops” Snell writes, “Yarn hoops are warm hugs in the winter time!” In her first tutorial she shares instructions on how to transform a hoop into something a little more cozy. It’s a great winter project to do while watching a movie. She lives in Bordentown, New Jersey, USA.
by Philo Hagen
December 1, 2011 in Features, Health and Spirit, Hoop-Making
by Philo Hagen
Thanksgiving night I was driving down Santa Monica Boulevard while thinking that I really should have passed on that second piece of pumpkin cheesecake when I saw them. They were in sleeping bags. They were huddled inside makeshift tents. They were lined up down the street and around the corner for as far as my fleeting eye could see. No, they weren’t Occupy Protesters. They were Black Friday holiday shoppers and they had one of those big corporate megastores surrounded. Earlier in the evening, between the turkey and the dessert, my friend had turned on the television and a news reporter was interviewing one of them at some other store somewhere else in America. A middle-aged woman who’d been camped out all day was asked what she was waiting to purchase. Her response, “I don’t know. We’ll know when we see what’s on sale.”
While I’m not one of those who thinks that buying nothing is a great idea when so many of our hoop community friends have small businesses whose very livelihood depends upon us this holiday season, I don’t think anyone can deny that it’s gotten a little crazy. Rather than sleeping on a cold, concrete sidewalk in the hopes of saving a few bucks on items I hadn’t even planned on getting, I decided to come up with my own hooper holiday plan. It seems to me a key part of the very nature of the holidays is to be thoughtful of others, our family and friends, even strangers in need. The greatest gifts I’ve personally received were ones that were given with thoughtfulness behind them and when I think about all that hooping has done for me in my life, and continues to do, this year the plan is to affordably share this gift with others. This year I’m going to be giving a gift that keeps on giving. Read the rest of this entry →
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