Anxiety fuels artist's cute enamel pin creations

Jamila Benson runs a pop-up shop for Anxiety and Kimbap / Courtesy of Anxiety and Kimbap

By Chantal Terblanche

Late in 2018, Jamila Benson was going through a dark time in her life and her health was declining. She described experiencing tense jaw muscles, a relentless ringing in her ears and what felt like frequent mini-heart attacks. After weeks of struggling alone in silence, she sought out help. It was then she found out that she was experiencing anxiety.

While thinking of random things to keep her mind occupied, she had the idea to "step out of (her) comfort zone and shake things up," as she described it in an interview with The Korea Times. The following year, she started planning it all out, fueled by anxiety about the future and a dash of existential dread.

Her calling? Enamel pins, with designs inspired by her experiences living in Korea and her pop culture nostalgia.

All she needed was a name for her store to sell her creations in. At first, Benson struggled to come up with a name for her shop. Every name she came up with felt forced and she couldn't settle on one.

Then one night, while joking to herself looking at all the convenience store gimbap wrappers in her trash, the idea came to her: "Anxiety and Kimbap." It felt perfect. When people read, see or hear it, it makes them talk, and this is exactly the response she wanted.

Some of Anxiety and Kimbap's enamel pins / Courtesy of Anxiety and Kimbap

Benson designs pins and other merch that are greatly influenced by Korea (food, objects, language, etc.), pop culture and mental health themes.

A self-taught digital artist, she started university with a focus on art, but changed her major, ultimately graduating from the University of Montevallo in Alabama with a BS in psychology and a minor in social services. "Although I am not working in the field, my brand themes are heavily influenced by my past studies," she said.

She creates her products as she sees them having been missing in the market. "I collect enamel pins myself and I could never find interesting, fun, Korea-themed pins anywhere," she said.

Benson finds her inspiration for her pins in Korea and the people here, and she loves to people-watch to gain inspiration. "From fashion, to trends to language, it's forever changing," she said.

As she creates things that are meant to last for some time, she wanted to create things that are not only meaningful to her but also for others. It is also for this reason that she finds that people-watching helps.

"I also find inspiration in my own nostalgic thoughts which mostly consist of Western pop culture references," she added.

Anxiety and Kimbap's "Spooky Hearts" enamel pins show horror movie characters speaking in Korean. / Courtesy of Anxiety and Kimbap

Benson said the first pin she created was "a crappy sketch of a yogurt bottle with the word 'Tired' on it."

"It still holds a special place with me," she said. "At the time I started Anxiety and Kimbap, I was exhausted and wanted to design something that portrayed that."

One of her most popular designs is the "Tear Flavored Milk Enamel Pin."

"It was one of the second-batch pins I made when I started, sold out pretty fast when I had a smaller following," she said. "I would receive messages about the pin from people wanting to buy it, to the point that I remade it."

Other pin designs include her "Korean Folklore and Ghost Cats" prints and pins, various signs, including, "Noraebang" (singing room) and "Gangnam Subway Station," and commonplace items such as slippers, Choco Pies and a soju cap with the tab twisted up in a heart shape.

She sells her pins, stickers and buttons online but she really enjoys participating in markets where she gets to interact with customers in-person. She likes getting to know her customers and she wants them to know her too.

Benson said that the most memorable response she has had to date was when she met a person, at a friend's place, who didn't know her but knew her brand. "When I went over to talk with them, they freaked out with excitement," Benson said, "which surprised me, but after we chatted a bit, they told me, 'I really love your designs, they bring me joy and make my bags extra cool.'"

Anxiety and Kimbap is registered as a small business, not a profit-chasing corporation, and she prices her products based on the cost to manufacture them and the time to create the design. Essentially, as she put it, "people are buying something I designed myself, my art, just in pin or other product form."

The reactions towards her products have been positive. Her designs usually receive laughter which, to her, is a good thing. If you look at them and understand the joke, then Benson feels she was successful with her designs. Her goal for Anxiety and Kimbap is to create relatable souvenirs while spreading mental health awareness.

Some of Anxiety and Kimbap's stickers / Courtesy of Anxiety and Kimbap

Benson has also been giving back to the community with her "Seconds for a Cause" campaign, reducing the price on pins that aren't sellable at full price, with profits from their sales donated to charities.

"Seconds are pins that have slight imperfections that are not up to my standards and I don't feel comfortable with selling at full price," she says on her website. "They are still cute and functional, and no pins with severe defects or damage will be included."

Profits from "Seconds for a Cause" pins sold on the Anxiety and Kimbap Shopify store go to Angel House Orphanage, a shelter for disabled and disadvantaged people. Pin sales on Etsy benefit the DDing Dong LGBTQ Youth Crisis Support Center, which provides resources, counseling and more for queer teens here in Korea.

Anxiety and Kimbap will have a pop-up shop in Seoul at Common Ground on Oct. 23 and 24 between noon and 8 p.m.

Visit anxietyandkimbap.com for links to Anxiety and Kimbap's Etsy Store, Shopify website and Naver Smartstore, as well as her social media channels on Instagram and Facebook, among others.

Chantal Terblanche, from South Africa, lives here with her dog, Samsung. She runs the blog ClumsyinKorea.com and the Korea Events group on Facebook.