Made entirely by hand.
Crafting in metal has taken me a number of places over the years. It has been a labor of love through and through. I have worked in and out of the jewelry industry since about 2015 mostly in Los Angeles and San Francisco. I avidly made necklaces from beads as a teenager, dreaming one day that I’d learn how to work metal.
Everything I do is by hand, I am a little old fashioned and largely self taught. I sculpt a lot of wax for jewelry by hand and after the wax is cast, I recycle the scraps down to ingot and press the ingots into wire and sheet that I then fabricate into more jewelry. It’s a very sustainable and seemless process with little waste.
I enjoy spending my free time in nature or winding down the hours on a motorcycle. I prefer desolate landscapes where I can enjoy uninterrupted and often untouched views. I like finding flowers, seed pods, creatures, seashells, interesting rocks. The texture of these things often shows up in my work, the repeating patterns of the natural world are what inspire me the most.
MY PROCESS:
I begin my creative process by filling a crucible with recycled silver. This might be in the form of clean scrap I have purchased from a supplier or leftover sprue bits from casting or pieces of metal left over from fabricating other jewelry. These scraps are melted into an ingot that I press into sheet metal or draw out into wire. It is a tedious process but allows me to have zero waste and continue to offer ethically made jewelry and fully hand crafted goods. My lost wax casting pieces are all sculpted by me in house and when I have access to the equipment, I do my own casting.
I derive the majority of my inspiration from nature, whether it is the texture of tree bark, hag stones, crystal matrix, roots or other things I may find on a trail hike, seashore or someplace from memory. I have lived all over the country and experienced a lot of what mainland America can offer. From the verdant press of trees here in Oregon to similar evergreen forests in Maine, from the rocky reefy coasts of California. From the marshy bayous and gulf coast shores of Louisiana to the red rock hoodoos of the Southwest’s four corners. The undulating repeating patterns of organic matter holds a magic that I believe our mind perceives beyond thought, much in the same way that scent evokes emotion.
I generally live in time with the lunar cycles in the same way I remember my mother telling me as a child that our Norse and Celtic ancestors did as farmers. No projects begin on a Friday or the 13th day of any month, it’s best to finish something on a full moon or begin the day after a new moon. Eclipse days are for sleeping in and taking a day’s rest. Prayers for inspiration are answered more frequently if petitioned during a quarter moon and fruition often culminates at the third quarter. If you are curious about the astrological information of my pieces, please message me, I am happy to share this information when and where I have recorded it.
You can follow my journey on Patreon or Instagram.
