In Her Element: Happy Medium's Tayler Carraway

October 28, 2026

Welcome to In Her Element, our new series celebrating inspiring creative women: their spaces, their creative processes, and the personal details that make their work uniquely theirs. Because the things we carry can be just as individual as the people carrying them.

For our first installment, we're meeting Tayler Carraway, one of the founders of Happy Medium, an incredible New York based art cafe, to talk about her creative practice, the space where ideas take shape, and the little details that make an everyday bag feel like her own.

MEET TAYLER

"In Her Element, a Parker Thatch Series: Tayler Carraway, Happy Medium" over a woman holding a cream canvas tote with red painted vertical stripes and a navy and red rope strap, leaning on a street pole

Tell us about yourself and why you create

“Hi, I am Tayler, one of the founders of Happy Medium. I create as a part of self-expression and really getting in touch with these emotions and feelings that I can’t express any other way. I find that when I am doing it in the physical art world it really enables me to access something that I can’t otherwise. I am always in that pursuit of trying to understand myself better, understand the world better, and for me, visual arts is a great way to do that.”

Person carrying a large unframed canvas, back side facing out, along a sidewalk past a brick warehouse; only their hands, jeans and red flats show

Three-panel collage of a creative workshop: a table with a small statue, dried hydrangeas and Happy Medium booklets; a large industrial space with easels; shelves of paint cans.

Describe your studio in three words.

“Playful, expansive and always changing.”

Two-photo collage: an artist in a denim jacket paints red stripes on a canvas bag at a paint-splattered table; right, red brushstroke drawings and brushes up close

When does a bag become truly yours?

“A bag, to me, really needs to look worn and lived in. There is nothing worse than having a bag that’s so pristine that you are almost too scared to use it. The easiest way to go about that is by making my own mark from the beginning.

Cream canvas tote with hand-painted red vertical stripes, black handles and a knotted red and blue rope strap, held in front of the body by a model Featured bag: Large IOMOI Canvas Tote with Navy Handles / Paracord Strap

This is an original cotton canvas bag from IOMOI, our founding name before it became Parker Thatch.

How did you choose the details and strap that make this bag feel like you?

“For this bag, what is so amazing is that it’s canvas. This is the first time I’ve had a blank canvas in the form of a bag, and it made the perfect excuse to paint it. You can never go wrong with a classic stripe, and on the other side, I painted a horse. Horses are central to the Happy Medium brand, and the red signifies my fiery side.

“The paracord strap gives you the option to wear it on the shoulder or even crossbody, which is perfect for when I have my hands full.”

Red paint strokes on white paper atop a paint-splattered wooden table, with a thick red paint puddle, used brushes, and the edge of a cream canvas bag with a red stripe and blue-and-red rope

What's one thing you always carry with you?

“A paint brush. It started by accident but quickly became super helpful for makeup touchups and painting quick mockups that a pen or pencil can’t replicate.”

Woman in an art studio looking into a cream canvas tote hand-painted with red vertical stripes and navy handles, beside a paint-covered worktable