Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

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Our Hardware Designs – In Target!

It’s been nearly three years in the making, so it’s hard to believe that the day is finally here that we can share our longest-stretching side-gig to date. We’ve been designing a collection of products… and a bunch of them are now being sold exclusively at Target (!!!). Cue the sound effect of a cat sprinting out of a bag.

Liberty Young House Love Target1

We designed three or four dozen pieces before the final mix was chosen – and those designs, which are an assortment of wall storage and hooks, are available right now at Target.com and will be on endcaps in most US stores starting March 31st.

You’ll be able to find them in the Home Improvement section where they’ll be hanging out for 14 weeks. Did I mention that we’re freaking out like Clara next to a furry mascot that she “just wants to hug and squeeze”?

Liberty Burger Hook

To say we never thought something like this would ever happen to us might be the biggest understatement of our blogging careers. And even when this process started rolling waaaaay back in July of 2011, we never expected that it would end up here.

Liberty Doorknob Hooks

When you look at the collection you’ll notice that we’ve adapted a lot of things that we love – from bees and old skeleton keys to a certain ridiculously handsome chihuahua. And everything’s priced at $14.99 or less.

Liberty Bees

We even included a bit of DIY customization in the mix, thanks to these raw wood hook rails (one with a picture ledge on top, and one without) that you can personalize with paint, stain, wallpaper, decoupage, or whatever else you have on hand. Then you can choose any of the four hardware styles in either oil-rubbed bronze or white and screw them into the predrilled rail holes.

Liberty Painted Decoupaged

But let’s rewind back to July of 2011, when this whole thing started. At that time, a company called Liberty Hardware was a sidebar blog sponsor of ours and they asked to come interview us for some research they were doing about the do-it-yourself trend. A few months later, that research turned into an invitation to explore the possibility of designing some products with them. When we said yes there was no part of us that ever envisioned them ending up in a store like Target.

Liberty Key Rail

The next two years were an exciting and sometimes intense process of design and development. Never again will we underestimate the work that goes into making those everyday products that we see on store shelves. We were primarily responsible for the creative direction, which involved providing everything from rough sketches to color/finish input along with design tweaks and feedback at every step of the design process. Liberty’s team was great to work with, and had things like manufacturing feasibility and sales analysis covered – which was a huge necessity to taking our ideas from paper (and visions in our heads) to real-life objects.

162003 YHL Octopus Hook Teal1

The development process was hugely interesting to us because it was like nothing we had ever seen. From the drawings & images that we provided, the Liberty design team would illustrate some options, the best of which then got modeled either on a computer or in clay by hand (sometimes both). Those then became 3D printed models that could get cast to become real production prototypes and eventually the final product was born. There was feedback, tweaking, and even a few “back to the drawing board” moments at each step in the process. Questions of scale, symmetry, functionality, finish, price, etc. were always being considered – as well as how everything would fit together as a collection. Heck, there was even a focus group held at one point! So all-in-all we probably designed forty or fifty pieces before they got narrowed down to the current mix.

Liberty Process

While lots of the design work happened virtually (through email and conference calls), The Liberty team – which is primarily headquartered about 3.5 hours from us in Winston-Salem, NC – traveled to Richmond on several occasions. We also found ourselves traveling to see them in North Carolina, meeting with their design team in Chicago (that’s Adam pictured, who has been bringing our ideas to life from day one of the project), and even flying out to the Target headquarters in Minneapolis at one point. Despite that meeting happening in late April of last year, we still happened to catch a major snowstorm. We’re not sure how you Minnesotans do it.

Liberty Meetings

That trip in Minneapolis was especially surreal, since it happened just a few months after we had been there for our book tour. It was weird to be secretly traveling there after so freely Instagramming our previous tour travels. We actually got recognized a couple of times while standing outside of the Target offices, so we were pretty freaked out that our cover was blown (to the folks who said hi to us, we can now apologize for being SO INSANELY AWKWARD). Secrets are no fun.

Liberty Target Dog

We shot the images you see in this post (and that appear on the packaging) in our house last November. It felt a lot like our book shoots when we were trying to create a diverse mix of backdrops in a house with very few painted walls, so we had to get a little creative. You can see in this photo that we used a remnant piece of grasscloth wallpaper to spice things up behind the Burger hook. And that’s our brother-in-law/pro-photographer Todd who did all of the shooting. Nothing like keeping it in the family.

Liberty Todd Shoot

Once it was cropped, you’d never know there was painters tape and blue trim lurking just out of frame.

Liberty Burger Hook

After all those months, all those trips and meetings, all those designs and redesigns, and all of the shooting/writing for the packaging, it still feels completely unreal that this project is out in the world now. And we’re even more excited to hopefully roll out more products as the year goes on. Yup, we’re actively pitching new designs that go beyond wall hooks and storage (Target prefers the idea of tight collections, so we’re working on different home/DIY themes that could be switched out seasonally).

We owe a huge thanks to all of the people who’ve been a part of this, especially those who have put up with our silly questions or nit-picky changes. So a big virtual hug goes out to everyone who saw something in our ideas, and helped bring them to life.

Liberty Picture Hangers

And of course we have an insane amount of love for you guys for sharing this crazy journey with us (and for putting up with our “secret project” for so long – we really wished we could have told you, oh, 32 months ago). Never in our wildest dreams did we think that first post back in 2007 would lead us here. Oops, I think the orchestra is playing me out, but picture me waving my chihuahua hook in the air while Sherry gracefully trips over her gown on the way down the steps. She’s the J. Law to my J. Leto (I just have to work on my flowing man-mane).

You can browse and buy everything now over on Target.com, and then it’ll be in most stores beginning March 31st. Fingers crossed that the sight doesn’t send Sherry into labor!

Target Screen Capture

Update – Some of the most frequent requests that we get are for info about professionally blogging (how we made our site, how we grew our following, how we make money, etc) so we shared all of the details about how we started a blog, grew our traffic, and turned it into a full time job. 

Comments

  2. Teresa @ wherelovemeetslife says

    First let me say how awesome this is!!! :) Congrats guys!
    Second- way to fuel an already over-blown addiction to target. LOL!!!!! And here is hoping that more items are in the future! I love the collection and can’t wait to buy something!Ok, enough exclamation points.

    Also, hope your feeling well Sherry- I know the homestretch is the most challenging/exciting part of a new baby!

    Reply

  3. Arlene says

    Wow congratulations!! It blows my mind to see how much the blog YHL has grown into its own YHL brand over the 5 years I’ve been following!! I can’t even imagine the pride and happiness you both must be feeling!! SO happy for you guys!! <3

    Reply

  4. Jen says

    Yay! So happy for you guys ! The hooks look great and thanks for teaming up with a store that is selling them at an affordable price .:)

    Reply

  6. Anu says

    My Goodness! How exiting! I have always loved the elephant hook or giraffe hook you use to hang the paint deck from…..
    These look great. can’t wait to meet them in person on the 31st. Congrats!!

    Reply

  8. Jamie says

    I’m so excited for you guys, congratulations! I totally ran (virtually) to the website and ordered 3 of the bee hooks in white because they are the PERFECT solution for our front of house lack of storage issue. They will look adorable over our shoe bench and I’m so excited to see them in person when they ship :)

    Reply

  9. Michelle (aka mybelle101) says

    WOOOOOOOOOOO to the HOOOOOOOOOO!!! That is so awesome! As if Target wasn’t already one of my favorite places ever…I swear it just keeps getting better! Can’t wait to see the stuff in store. You’ll have to think up an instagram hashtag so we can all post our findings ;)

    Reply

  13. Christine says

    Congrats!!!!! So absolutely thrilled for you guys (although, I hope this is just the beginning! Love all the hook designs but come on, I need poufs, rugs, lamps, wallpaper… the whole she-bang!!)

    So well deserved! I can’t imagine what it must feel like to have such a huge accomplishment occur at the exact same time your family is expanding. I can only imagine how overwhelming it must feel (like almost too many blessings ?!?!We’re due about a week apart and just thinking about it makes me a bit weepy!).

    Congrats times a thousand!!

    Reply

  14. JebberJay says

    How do you do it?? Your team of two Petersiks accomplishes more than I can wrap my head around. These are awewsome. I hope they make it to Target in Canada. Kudos.

    P.S. You should write a book on time management. You obviously know how to manage your time.

    Reply

  15. Sally G. says

    What the what!?! Congrats! I’m super impressed that you managed to keep the cat in the bag this whole time, I’d have been freaking out :-) And we have a snow day in lovely D.C. today, so I’ll be heading over to Target’s website to shop your lovely collection right about now… Hope you guys aren’t getting this cold, snowy weather down in Richmond!

    Reply

  16. Gray says

    This is amazing! Congratulations! Never what I would have guessed of your “secret project” but I love every.single.piece.

    Reply

  17. danica says

    congrats on such an exciting opportunity! I love that you guys are so humble about it. Looks like some really fun products that I can’t wait to see at my Target.

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      From what we hear if you guys ask for it on Target Canada’s Facebook page (or via their Twitter account), they’re a lot more likely to be responsive – so feel free to tell yours that you’d like to see it! We also have an international giveaway lined up in early April, so anyone in the world can win the entire collection :)

      xo
      s

  20. Courtney H says

    Ahhhh! yayayayayayayayayayayayayyayayayayayayayayayayaa!!! Happy dance, happy dance, happy dance. “I just wanna scream, and shout, and let it all out.” I have been wanting you guys to get some products out there soo bad… I can not wait to add some young house love decor in my home finally! Con-grats-to the-ulations!!!

    Reply

  22. Courtney K says

    Congratulations you two!! That is SO EXCITING! Can’t wait to take a peek at everything once it hit stores.

    P.S. Love that the bee made the cut. I made sure my honeycomb/bee design made it onto my stationery too! Can’t get enough of them.

    Reply

  24. Nicki says

    Congratulations!! So cool for you! I definitely will be picking up a doggie hook gap for the leashes in the mud room area and sons of those nifty tacks. So exciting for you!

    Reply

  25. Katie says

    I. Can. Not. Even.

    Probably since I started reading this blog (about the time you started this project actually) I have thought how great it would be for you guys to design for Target. Sometimes the stuff they have reminds me of YHL! (honeycomb vase, anyone?)

    Super thrilled for you!

    Reply

  27. Jen P says

    We, your readers, are insanely happy for you! I’m sure it’s going to be a huge success for you! I am just waiting for the surprise that includes a summer beach house (ok dreaming) just to see what you would do with a beachy theme.

    Reply

  29. Amy C says

    Congrats! Adorable! Love the Octopus…do you think the hook is big enough to support a hand towel? Am thinking it would be cute in my boys’ bathroom. thanks and good luck!

    Reply

  30. Nicki says

    Congratulations!! So cool! I definitely will be picking up a doggie hook for the leashes in the mud room area and some of those nifty tacks.
    So exciting for you, enjoy!

    Reply

  33. Corinne says

    What a fabulous surprise for all of us who have been following your blog and your improvements (to the houses of course…you are both fine as you are). Clean living, excellent design and hard work have been recognized by a retail giant. Congrats…the products are great!

    Reply

  34. kristi says

    Weird because I need more hooks for my mudroom. I think I might have to get some customizable ones. Crazy cool that you got this opportunity. Congrats!

    Reply

  36. Susan Riggs says

    Congratulations! It is so nice to see a nice, happy, loving couple who work so hard get ahead like this. I am so happy for you two, three, four, oh no, five to be! Keep up the posts we are all loving it!
    Thanks, Sue

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      We actually went in with a ton of different items, so it was interesting to watch how Target works to whittle things down and make really tight themes. Picture everything from decorative boxes, vases, and shelving to hanging planters, customizable frames, and trays being on the table along with some hooks and rails. They saw those and wanted to explore a tight collection of wall stuff for the first installment, so we focused on those while keeping everything else in the wings. We hope a lot of that will get to resurface in future collections along with new items!

      xo
      s

  38. Jess says

    I just had a feeling that your secret project was something Target related! Big congratulations to you both! SO exciting!

    Reply

  40. Alicia says

    Y’ll and Target…what an awesome combo!! I’ve been trying to figure out what the secret project could be and never imagined this. I love it! What a great adventure for a couple that certainly deserves it!

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      They’re designed and engineered in the US by Liberty Hardware – in North Carolina and Illinois – and they’re manufactured overseas in China, where Liberty also has an office full of employees.

      xo
      s

  43. andrea says

    The are sooo cute! Are any of them big enough to be a hook for a hand towel in a powder room? I have been looking for a cute one for a LONG time.

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      The chihuahua hooks, doorknob hooks, or the bee hooks would be awesome for bath towels (the octopus has shallower hooks that might work for hand towels or thin dish towels, but the other three have heftier ones for thicker/bigger towels).

      xo
      s

  45. Christel says

    Hooray!!! So exciting! I can’t wait to shop these items. Do you know where they are made/manufactured? (In the USA hopefully?) Just curious. Big congratulations!!

    Reply

  46. Mariya says

    Holy smokes. I’m seriously excited. Hope they don’t sell out quick for my sake, or do for yours. I want at least 3 things already.

    Reply

  48. Patti says

    Wow!WOW!WOW! So happy and excited for you guys!! Love when good things happen to good people like you!! Off to Target to shop YHLovers!

    Reply

  50. Linda says

    Oh, congratulations, you guys!!!! and I have a nice little Target gift card that has just been sitting in my purse for a while. I know where I’ll be on March 31! The ledge seems to be calling my name!

    Seriously, I feel like a proud mama. I can only imagine how happy your families are for you.

    Reply

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