Our former colleague Vickie Chang highlights the Long Beach Craft Mafia in this week’s OC Weekly with a great piece about the crafting revolution.

Featured along with ladies like Family Tree’s Lexi Lee and OCW cover model Liz Abbott is Steph Calvert, whose robot art you may remember from our year end issue last year.

“The idea of Craft Mafia as a whole is that everybody who is in it has some kind of DIY, indie-crafty business,” Calvert explains. “It’s about networking, where you share info and ask questions: ‘Hey, I heard about this show coming up,’ ‘I’m having a problem making this,’ or ‘How should I set up my table for a show?’ We have to pay dues to Austin to use the Craft Mafia name, it’s kind of like . . .”

“The Mafia?” suggests Abbott.

“A Mafia,” repeats Calvert, laughing. “We gotta pay our dues. To the big bosses!”

“Or you get whacked,” finishes Abbott.

More of Steph’s art can be seen in the show “coming clean: secrets and stories from catholic school” on view at the Kids Are Alright on Broadway through Sept. 30.

Tags: CRAFTING, DIY, FAMILY TREE, KIDS ARE ALRIGHT, Long Beach, LONG BEACH CRAFT MAFIA, OC Weekly, STEPH CALVERT