HispanicBusiness

Like one of her boldly colorful, well-assembled love shrines, Kathy Cano-Murillo's career has come together nicely.

But for the woman dubbed the "Crafty Chica," the road to mainstream success -- from selling her Mexican pop art out of her home to launching a mass-retail line of craft products -- was strewn with fabric scraps, paint and loads of glitter.

On her Web site, CraftyChica.com, Cano-Murillo, 44, admits to being a "hardcore craftaholic," but she wasn't always one.

As a young wife and mother in Arizona in the early 1990s, she and her husband Patrick, an artist and musician, started their own business making Mexican pop art. With two children and in an 800-square-foot home, the couple filled their orders. From storing to producing to shipping, every room of their modest home was used for their art business.

After the family went broke, Cano-Murillo got a part-time position at the local newspaper, the Arizona Republic in Phoenix. She worked various jobs there, including news clerk in the Features department. When Cano-Murillo, who had an associate of arts degree in marketing and a strong knowledge of pop culture, was promoted to full-time clerk, entertainment writing was added to her slate of duties.

Cano-Murillo and her husband were still operating their home-based art business when an editor at the Republic asked her to write an arts and crafts column.

"At first, I balk," she said. "'I don't do crafts, I do art!'" she said she told the editor.

"When people said 'crafts,' I thought of my Nana's doily tissue-roll covers (they were very beautiful, don't get me wrong!)," Cano-Murillo told HispanicBusiness.com. But through a craft Web site she stumbled onto, "I met other women, my age, who were doing hip crafts like I wanted to do," she said. "It clicked at that moment that a new generation of crafters were emerging, and I dove right in!"

She took on the newspaper column, and by 2000, she was hooked on crafting, launching the Web site CraftyChica.com to, as she puts it, "preach the gospel of cool crafts to the masses."

Her crafts quickly gained popularity. She said she was "tired of not finding any cool Latino-themed craft products at stores, (just) really cheesy Latino-themed projects to make." All she could find were projects such as children's crafts using paper plates for Cinco de Mayo. She decided to make her own "Latino-chic" home decor items and accessories.

"So many women responded that they loved the ideas," the Mexican-American crafter said. "I realized there was a niche that needed to be filled, so I went for it. And it is not just Latinas who love this style -- it is anyone who loves bright colors, cultures, arts, traveling, etc."

The next few years were busy ones for Cano-Murillo. Her column went syndicated, published nationwide. She attended night school to finish earning her bachelor's degree. She was approached by a book editor to write her first two books. She was even hired to create pieces for the cast members as well as media gifts for "Frida," the film based on the life of Frida Kahlo starring Salma Hayek.

Quick to follow were securing an agent; deals for more books, including a novel; and lines of home decor products for Lowe's stores and jewelry for Target. She also does a Webisode crafting series for Lifetime TV and has held "crafting cruises" for several years.