Pixel Time to open at CityArts

WICHITA — The growing number of events downtown is actually attracting businesses, too.

Skyler Lovelace is moving her company, Pixel Time, to CityArts in part because she wants to be where she perceives the excitement to be.

“I wanted to be downtown so bad I could taste it,” Lovelace says.

Her business, which is teaching families how to maximize and have more fun with their computers, had been on 29th Street near Rock Road.

Lovelace says she often found herself stuck at her office around the time things like Final Friday events were starting downtown.

When she moved the bulk of her office into her new space on July 31st, it was the same night of the All-America City block party in Old Town Square where CityArts also is located.

“We were pretending it was like welcoming us to the square,” Lovelace says, laughing.

Classes won’t start in the new space until Sept. 12.

Lovelace, who also is the lead instructor for digital media at Butler Community College, says she wants her classes to complement other things CityArts offers.

She says her agreement there is almost like she’s a guest artist.

“What’s different about me is I brought a lot more equipment than would a typical artist.”

Secret Boutique to share Delano space with Eye Kandy Custom Paint & Pin-up Portraits

weddingdressWICHITA — Sara Locke, who is better known as Jade Locke in the art community, is joining her friend Aleycia Crawford to share space for a new business in Delano.

As Have You Heard? reported Wednesday, Crawford is moving her Eye Kandy Custom Paint & Pin-up Portraits to 915 W. Douglas in time for July’s Final Friday.

That’s also when Locke will open her Secret Boutique.

“I’ve been online,” Locke says. “Now I’m branching out into a shop.”

Her specialty is corsets.

“I make corsets for clients all over the world,” Locke says.

Some are for underclothing — and can instantly shave off 10 to 15 pounds, Locke says — and some are for outerwear.

“They’re coming back into fashion,” says Locke, who has been sewing and designing clothes since she was about 11.

She also custom designs nontraditional wedding gowns (that’s Locke in her own wedding gown that she designed).

Locke’s day job is as an insurance secretary, but she hopes to make Secret Boutique her full-time job.

“When the economy picks back up, yes.”

Eye Kandy Custom Paint & Pin-up Portraits coming to Delano

pinupWICHITA — There are several new businesses coming to the Delano area, including one that features pin-up girls.

Aleycia Crawford hopes to open her Eye Kandy Custom Paint & Pin-up Portraits at 915 W. Douglas for July’s Final Friday.

Currently, her business is at 21st and Broadway.

“I want something nicer, bigger,” Crawford says.

“They’ve fixed up the area,” she says of Delano. “It seems to work together really well.”

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