As a child growing up on a dairy and grain farm in Northeast Ohio, I was mostly surrounded by my family, our animals and lots of fields and woods. My siblings and I were left to invent our own fun with all that was around us, catching tadpoles in the pond or playing with the calves and kittens in the barn. Whether I was drawing the landscape, robbing my mom’s flower beds to create elaborate bouquets or nailing together scraps of wood from my dad’s workshop, I was encouraged to explore my environment. This continued throughout my childhood and adolescence and led me to pursue a career in the arts.

In 1997 I was off to the Cleveland Institute of Art. There, they offered a number of disciplines within the arts, including Enameling, which became my major and Jewelry and Metals, my minor. The school had a balance of promoting conceptual and fine arts as well as fostering practical applications in your field of interest. Although I took classes in various disciplines, it was the production and business education that interested me the most.

Upon graduation my years spent in the field have ranged from numerous teaching positions, studio artisan roles, management in jewelry production and my own small business. Although my jewelry work has changed through the years, my raw approach to making and creating remains much the same. It is developed with the curiosity and exploration of my surroundings and inferences just as it was when I was growing up. Sketching ideas of my jewelry on paper is a small part of my process. The hands-on experimentation of multiple materials is when the simple sketches expand the ideas further and eventually become prototypes for the final designs.

It gives me great pleasure to share my creations with costumers like you. You’re the customer who sees and values not only the finished product, but the journey that it has taken to make it come to fruition.