Conversations with Shelby Treichler

Today we’d like to introduce you to Shelby Treichler.

Hi Shelby, so excited to have you on the platform. So, before we get into questions about your work life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today. 
In 2019, I found myself living in Atlanta and almost 10 years deep in a career as a props person on films and television. Although I was working what I thought was my dream job, I found myself getting more and more burned out by the work. The year before, I had started rock climbing and, for the first time in my adult life, had friends outside of the film industry. To connect with my new community, I made three sticker designs and printed a small run to hand out to my climbing buddies. When a climber in the gym offered to pay for a couple extra and asked what I charged, it dawned on me for the first time that I could earn money from my art. That was the beginning of Cactus to Pine. What started as a few sticker designs has grown beyond my wildest imagination. My products are as diverse as my interest. I design stickers and pour candles. I laser-cut wood and sculpt with retired rock-climbing rope. Whenever I get burned out, I create something new. In 2020, the film industry shut down, and I shifted full-time to my business. By 2021, I was earning enough that I knew I would never need to return to film. I sold my house bought a camper and took my business and my life on the road. I loved being outside, but with so many friends and family in the southeast, I found myself always returning here. Last February, I parked my camper in Asheville, NC with the intention of making NC my home again. 

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Running an art business as a one-woman show is the highest of highs and the lowest of low. On the one hand – I have ultimate freedom. I decide when I work, where I work, and what I work on. But this much freedom can be isolating. I miss collaboration and working on a team. And, after so much time on the road, I crave community. I originally hadn’t intended to run a small business. There were a lot of crash courses and long nights at YouTube University. The art and production have always come naturally to me. The accounting and marketing have taken some practice. It’s a lot of plates to keep spinning. There are only so many hours in the day and only so much multi-tasking you can accomplish before something slips through the cracks. 

And it’s hard to keep a work-life balance. Your success relies a little bit on luck but mostly on how hard you’re willing to grind. But if you don’t make space for the things you enjoy in life, what’s the point? I’m constantly having to remind myself it’s okay to take breaks and do stuff just for fun and not for monetization. 

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Right now, my favorite medium is crafting out of retired rock-climbing rope. I upcycle the old rope into new goods like coozies, bowls, and trays. There are benefits to working with salvaged materials. It’s usually cheaper than new materials, and there is the added benefit that it keeps them out landfills. And it satisfies a deep creative itch of mine to imagine something new out of something old. But it can take a lot of time and energy to track the old ropes down. I work with climbing gyms and guide companies. They retire rope pretty quickly when it’s no longer safe to climb on. Oftentimes, that rope will go to the landfill. In 2019, I saw my gym throwing some rope out and hated the idea of the pretty rope going to waste. I snagged a few pieces, convinced I could find some use for them. I found an online tutorial from 2015 on how to make a can coozie. But they would use a lighter and burn the rope as they went, and I HATED the smell and the idea of breathing in chemicals. I started working on my own design, using adhesive instead of burning. The design just flowed, and I hammered out a few different styles, including a handled coozie for a mason jar. I was hooked. It’s now been four years I’ve been perfecting these designs and diversifying my products. 

In 2020, I was trying to make a slender sleeve for a flask using only rope sheath. The sheath is the colorful outer part of the rope and can be flattened when the core is removed. Gluing that narrow strip was so tricky, and so I taught myself to sew, which opened up even more possibility with the material. Most recently, I was asked by some rafting friends to devise a hands-free coozie that could hang around their neck while they are paddling, and it’s been SO fun. 

There was a big boom in 2020 of people discovering climbing rope as a medium, and so many more artists are work with it now. It’s amazing to see what new creations people devise. It’s even more amazing that we are keeping so much rope out of the landfill. And it keeps me on my toes to always be pushing my art and trying to find new styles and designs that keeps my work unique. 

What sort of changes are you expecting over the next 5-10 years?
There will be more and more artists working in retired rope moving forward. And I think it’s just a matter of time before some of the bigger companies with more resources begin making products out of retired rope. It’s too rich of a resource to be ignored. Big rope manufacturing companies like Edelrid and Sterling already host recycling bins in gyms around the country for climbers to deposit their ropes. On a large scale, I’m so grateful these companies are taking responsibility and making efforts to reduce the impact their products have on the world. But on a personal level, I wonder how it will affect us small makers and artists. I joke that climbing rope is a renewable resource because there is always a climber SOMEWHERE that is retiring a rope. But as the market becomes more saturated with climbing rope ware products, it’s a good push for me to find other material waste for manufacturing companies that I can design new products around. 

Contact Info:

• Website: https://cactustopine.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cactus_to_pine/

Image Credits
Shelby Treichler