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homeofpoi.com
Homeofpoi.com is a major hub for all things poi, offering a wide selection of gear, photo galleries, event listings, and the most popular english poi-community forums in the universe. They are also an amazingly well-run company, a great group of people, and if you click through to them and buy something, we get a percentage of sales! You can also use referral code "sdecafingdengbmmqu" whenever you shop from them. We realize that it´s hard to pronounce "sdecafingdengbmmqu."
We particularly recommend Colecord (the ultimate poi string!),Fluffy Practice Poi as a great beginner set, Rainbow Strobe LED Poi (if you can´t afford flowtoys), Drew´s incredible Contact Juggling Book (we know, it´s not about poi but it will make you better at all forms of manipulation), the cathedral oval-link fire-poi for fire spinning (upgrade to Mega Heads if you want big fire), and of course the Poi Pendants! There are too many products to list, actually, so just go browse around.
flowtoys.com
flowtoys.com: Sean and Prisna at flowtoys are wonderful people and good friends friends of mine. They are kinetic toy enthusiasts and their flowlights are currently my favorite LED toys available. Also, if you click through playpoi and buy something, I get a percentage! To top it off they are selling and wholesaling our DVDs :)
The flowlights were designed from scratch by Sean and Prisna and co. This took a lot of vision, time, money, and love. I'm quite inspired that people from my own circle of friends are doing this kind of production, and I am hoping that I can help rally the community behind them (which will be easy as long as they keep making the best toys.)
feuershow.de
Feuershow.de is a German gear shop run by the wonderful Sam and friends. We are very impressed by a few of their products, such as Lycopodium Powder, which is actually the pollen from a flower, Dragon's Tongues, which let you do safe fire-breathing with the Lycopodium, Jelly-Fix Powder, for safe fire sculpture, High Quality Wick-Tape, the Ball-Bearing Swivels that I rave about, their Amazing Pyrofluid and Fire-Toy Fluid (which can be shipped abroad), and the rubber ducks.
Ball Bearing Swivels now available at poi shops!
In more yayness: These are the ball bearing swivels I'm always showing people. You can use them with any kind of poi to improve hyperloops and orbitals, and the general play of your poi. I first found them at a deep sea fishing shop in Vancouver, and now my favorite poi shops are offering them. Feuershow.de was the first, soon to be joined by homeofpoi.com.
Chain Guards
If you love spiral wraps, you'll love Burn Guards. Slide them down the chain to cover the metal bits near the poi, and pull them back up when you dip the poi (Don't dip the guards or they will burn up. I usually even pour some water on them). The guards help reduce the risk of burns, but they don't offer complete protection. Perform spiral wraps at your own risk. A big thanks to Sam at Feuershow.de for first introducing me to Amarid tubing two years ago.
Colecord, and the Perfect Poi
I have loved Colecord ever since Cole (aka Coleman) gave me a pair of poi at the European Juggling Convention in 2006. They were immediately my favorite practice poi because colecord is a) very comfortable, b) very strong, c) slightly springy, and d) has the perfect amount of friction.
I decided then that the whole world should have access to Colecord, but we could only find is as "USD Professional Inline Skate Laces," and it was expensive. My mission to bring colecord to the masses stayed on my things-to-do-list for a year.
Then, last sping, I started to correspond with Homeofpoi.com about gear design (amung other things). I sent them samples of colecord and they found the manufacturer in Taiwan, meaning you can buy Colecord at homeofpoi.com for less than half the price of purchasing inline skate Laces! Yayness!
Oh, and tell them that they should supply the ball-bearing fishing swivels that I love so much! :)
Poi Pendants
The poi pendants are finished and available on homeofpoi.com!
This is one of my cherished projects from Bali. They are carved out of bone and horn by a sweet family of Balinese artists I met in Ubud (the cultural hub of Bali). The design ideas came via a series of visions and a lot of sketching, and were influenced by the people and events and art I encountered in Bali. The symbols have been a work in progress ever since Alex and I designed the first DVD. We'll add more symbols as the ideas evolve...
making practice poi with tennis balls
To the right are the various tools you'll need to make a simple pair of tennis ball practice poi.
- Two tennis balls
- Two lengths of string. Length: from your fingertips to your far shoulder
- Either a length of coat-hanger with a little loop at one end, or a hollow pen
- Scissors for cutting string and leather
Show Your Poi
We often get emails asking us about poi, how to make them, how to hold them, etc. Since we had such a great crew of poi spinners in Thailand, we decided to Show our Poi. Bound to give you lots of ideas for practice and fire poi possibilities :)
order Nick's book: Emails from (Over?) the Edge
Poi isn't Nicks only talent. He's also a ´great writer, and Emails from (Over?) the Edge is his greatest achievement yet. All book sales will help playpoi, because Nick's a pretty dedicated artist and he's currently putting most of his efforts into poi artistry. The rest of his projects are equally exciting, but we'll get into that another time.
BUY NOW FROM FILMBABY
Multiball Contact by Drew Batchelor
Multiball Contact is a way to understand where poi is going. His process of visualizing and creating shapes and movement in space is very much what I've tried to do with poi. I recommend reading it and applying the concepts to poi. It is written by Drew Batchelor of ministryofmanipulation.com, who is a) one of the smartest people I have ever met and b) a pillar in the juggling and spinning communities.
You should go out and buy this book, because you will be smarter and sexier and better at anything you choose to do with your life after reading it. Enough said? I'm glad we had this talk.