Community guidelines
Last updated 10 October 2026
Family-friendly, always
ByHand is browsed by people of all ages, often with children nearby. We don't allow anything sexually explicit or adult-only, anywhere on the site:
- No nudity or sexual content in photos, artwork, updates or comments.
- No adult products, even if they're handmade.
- No linking to shops or pages that sell or show adult content.
Life drawing and figurative art can be a grey area. If a shop's work includes nudity, it isn't a fit for ByHand, however tasteful. Shops that break this rule are taken down without warning.
What counts as handmade
- You, or a small team you work alongside, make the things you sell.
- Tools and machines are fine (a wheel, a lathe, a loom, a press, a tablet). Factories are not.
- No reselling, white-labelling or drop-shipping.
- Prints you make yourself are welcome, from linocuts to your own artwork on your own printer. Designs a print-on-demand service prints and posts for you are not.
- Digital art counts when you draw it yourself. AI-generated images don't.
Be kind
- No insults, harassment, threats, or hateful content about anyone's identity.
- No spam, self-promotion in other makers' comments, or links to unrelated sites.
- Don't share anyone's personal details, including your own.
- Disagree with care. Makers put a lot of themselves into their work.
- Makers can say who runs their shop (under "Run by"). It's their word and we don't ask for proof. Only choose a community you belong to, and don't question anyone else's: report a shop only if you're sure it's untrue. Reports used to target a maker for who they are are treated as harassment.
How moderation works
- A language filter checks comments and updates as you post them. If it stops you, please reword; it can't tell context, so if it's got it wrong, email us.
- Reports. Every shop, update and comment has a Report link. Reports go to our moderators, and nobody else sees who reported what.
- Automatic hiding. When several members report the same comment or update, it's hidden until a moderator decides. If it's fine, it comes back.
- Decisions. Moderators can remove content, take a shop down, or suspend an account. Repeated or serious breaches lead to a permanent ban.
Think we got a decision wrong? Email contact@byhand.studio and a different moderator will look again. See the terms of use for the formal version.