Suzelle DIY shares the secret of how to be craftily 'crehative'

SuzelleDIY has won the hearts of YouTubers with her faintly gormless life hacks. She shared her wisdom with Karin Schimke

When I roll up through the magnificent, almost preposterous columns that mark the entrance to the Mount Nelson Hotel, a security guard stops me.

"I'm here to interview someone," I tell him.

"Suzelle?"

"Yes."

"Then why do you say 'someone'?"

He grins, steps back and waves me through.

Perhaps he only knows her because he's been told to expect a string of journalists. But then again, Suzelle is not just any old someone. She's a particularly recognisable someone. As she sashays over the hotel's patio, into the bar and through the sunny breakfast room, heads turn and there's a susurration of "That's Suzelle!" "There's Suzelle!"

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But this is a grand hotel where guests almost unconsciously assume an air of restrained grandness, even if they've only come for a cup of coffee, so no one is shrieking and no one is mobbing her. After a week and a half of being stormed off her pedicured tootsies by adoring fans, the hotel's rarefied atmosphere must be a welcome break for South African internet DIY sensation, Suzelle.

"The Mount Nelson is so fancy," she says, keeping her elbow tucked in as she waves an open palm at the surroundings to indicate all the fanciness. "I wish that I was staying here. It's so glamorous and gorgeous. And it's painted my favourite colour. I feel very at home here." She sighs briefly and looks down and away from the pink exterior in that inimitable Suzelle way. You momentarily feel her regret about having to sleep elsewhere tonight.

That a ditzy Afrikaans poppie from Somerset West could become so famous so quickly defies even her own expectations. There she was, just a year ago, paging through her magazines at the reception desk of the Somerset West guesthouse where she works. She came up with the idea of making some home DIY videos to put on YouTube and - with the help of her neighbour Hennie and her best friend Marianne - she brought South Africa the "bite-sized DIY web series" it didn't know it needed. Some episodes have clocked over 500,000 views.

And here she is now, being interviewed by journalists at South Africa's most famous hotel during her book tour to promote SuzelleDIY: The book (NB Publishers, R325). For two weeks she has had to negotiate cheering crowds of fans at her launches in Joburg and Cape Town.

Shame. She must be very tired. Zero-to-hero in one year would make anyone feel frazzled, even someone with Suzelle's studiously groomed air of can-do.

"Can you believe it," she exclaims about her sudden enormous success. "Sometimes it is quite overwhelming and I have to say to myself, 'Suzelle, just sit down, relax, don't feel overwhelmed. Just go with the flow, one foot in front of the other.' And that's what I've been doing."

On this unusually sunny day in Cape Town's slow-to-arrive spring, she is sitting ramrod straight in the "mottles" (her word for the dappled shade) on the patio, in a pretty green frock and her usual up-do, politely answering questions.

I'm tempted to write "poo-litely". It is hard to write about Suzelle without also wanting to talk like Suzelle.

She speaks good English with a strong Afrikaans accent. It's recognisable from its orotund vowels and the subtle brakes she puts on when an "r" comes along and her instinct to gooi tongue-to-palate has to be restrained. Her speech is pocked with colloquialisms and Afrikaans loan words, and local exclamations like "shame" and "there's it", a direct, ungrammatical translation of the Afrikaans "daar's hy" to indicate that a job's been done to satisfaction.

But while part of her success can be attributed to the subtle mockery of accent, another part belongs to how succinctly she captures something of the Afrikaans characteristic of 'n boer maak 'n plan. If there's a problem, there's a fix. Eskom darkening your doorway? Make a load-shedding kit! (Watch the video below.)

Hers is a pure and recognisable South African stoicism.

Suzelle comes across as both supremely confident and endearingly unsure. Sometimes, in her DIY videos, she opens her mouth to say something and then thinks better of it. She also allows her eyes to stray away from the camera, off to the side, as though anticipating some behind-the-scenes disaster, or to display uncertainty about how to proceed. All of these combine to make her seem vulnerable and fallible - but not incompetent - and therefore somehow lovable.

Yet if her DIY show were only a slapstick send-up of a fumbling homemaker, it might have failed. The thing about Suzelle is that her videos aren't just funny, they're clever and useful.

And so is her book, which is chock-full of ideas for cultivating practical domesticity, for everyone from beginners to dedicated DIYers.

It's also got some wacky stuff in it.

"That's for the humour and fun. We all need to lighten our lives. I'm not so serious."

We return to the issue of seriousness versus fun via the topic of creativity. The word "cre-hative" is one Suzelle utters often, both with the urgency of the newly converted and the conviction of a lifelong believer.

"I come from a very cre-hative household. One of my earliest memories is being on the back of the bakkie going to the hardware shop to buy bits and pieces when we were building things in the garden."

Why is creativity so important?

"There's a lot of crazy things happening in the world and it's hectic," she squeaks emphatically, just as the not-so-distant sound of sirens penetrates the clinky, breezy bubble of the Mount Nelson's patio.

"We all need to have a laugh. There's too much negativity. And that is why I'm so excited because of the comments and e-mails from people saying 'Suzelle, you are so positive. You are like a positive friend. You make me laugh and smile. You make me want to do something fun.'"

Superficial as it sounds, it strikes a chord. We are so mired in a national self-pity and general loathing that every day feels like a long slog through a minefield. Her frivolous videos offer some respite. I suggest perhaps she's becoming our national hero for "making things positive". This seems to delight her.

"Yes! Imagine that! A positivity activist. You are giving me ideas now. Maybe I'll write a politics book next."

Politics seems like it might be a bit of a stretch for this perfectly coiffed woman, who "excelled at school" and whose polished world seems to hold chaos at bay using pastel paint colours, a drill and some masking tape. Is her world really as perfect as it seems?

"Look, at the end of the day, I'm a human person. I don't think anything should be perfect. I make mistakes all the time," she says, ending on the accelerated upwards pitch of confident reassurance.

Indeed, for all the gloss of her eksie-perfeksie exterior, Suzelle's glitches aren't edited out of her videos, providing the precious "O fok!" moments her fans have come to love. Like the time she set the garden umbrella on fire while making a "braai pie".

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"It doesn't matter if things aren't perfect. We learn from our mistakes."

She runs through some DIY tips for nurturing and maintaining creativity, because "Don't you hate it when people say 'But Suzelle, I'm not creative'?"

Number one: "Anybody can. That's my motto. Everybody does have some creativity inside them, and it's all in different ways. Maybe you can paint a gorgeous picture, maybe I can't."

Number two: "Just go for it. Just try it. Doesn't matter if it's a little bit rustic."

Number three: "Do it a little bit every day."

Number four: "Experiment. Say to yourself, 'Hm, maybe I can try this instead.' You won't believe what you'll find!"

Number five: "Relaxing helps creativity. At the end of every day I take a long bath and just let my mind settle down. In those quiet moments I have my best ideas. Because otherwise you are running around like a mad person and you don't have time to think."

Number six: "Write it down. I keep a notebook and a flip-file. And I take pictures on my phone. And then Marianne puts them on to the computer for me. That's her special talent. She's very good with computer thingies."

Number seven: "Ignore the ugly guys. When I started my videos, Hennie told me about the trolls. Sometimes they say things like 'Suzelle, your voice irritates me.' But I don't say anything. Because that is the power I have. Those trolls want you to be upset. So I don't get upset, because then I'm giving them what they want. I just brush it off my shoulders. So forget that little guy sitting at home with his ugly comments. He doesn't need the attention. My tip is ignore, ignore, ignore."

She also has a general life tip - offered in a sentence that is an amazed exclamation from beginning to end - about the most important thing in the world.

"Just be yourself! Look at me! I just did what I love and now look! Here I am!"

THE REAL PERSON BEHIND THE YOUTUBE SENSATION

Suzelle is the creation of artist, illustrator and actress 33-year-old Julia Anastasopoulos and her partner Ari Kruger. She hails from Joburg and lives in Cape Town.

 In 2008 she won the Eskom Energy Efficient Lighting Design Competition. Her illustrations can be seen on the walls of MyCiti bus stops around Cape Town and on a wall in The Book Lounge.

She won the Channel24 award in 2014 for South Africa's favourite online celebrity. This year she took first place in the Superbalist 100 campaign, which names the top 100 young South Africans "helping to shape the scene".