Acorn and Artisan may be new to you and if so, we’re so happy you’ve joined our journey! This week I figured it’d be a great time to reintroduce ourselves and tell you about our story. Although I’ve always been a crafty person I didn’t start making jewelry until 2020. You see that summer my mom had a dream. In her dream I had made her a necklace and when she went out with friends to dinner she received compliments on it. That morning my mom called me and said, “Kelsey, you need to make jewelry.”
According to my husband, I’m a pretty superstitious person. I tend to look for signs in things and when she told me about her dream I figured who am I to question it. That summer I began making jewelry, but it wasn’t anything like the pieces I make today. I was finding my style in the beginning and trying to figure out what I wanted to make. Since I had been using resin for years, I started by making pieces out of resin. Then in 2021 I started making pieces with polymer clay. Through all this experimentation I learned a lot about different types of jewelry, but still my pieces didn’t feel right to me.
In my head I didn’t think I’d ever be able to make pieces out of metal. I wasn’t a metal smith, I had no training or knowledge, and I just felt like it wasn’t something I’d be able to do. Fast forward to January 2022, and everything started to change. Somewhere, somehow I decided that I should try. What was the worst that happened? I invested some time and money and found I was horrible at making metal jewelry? I started slowly by buying tools and pieces of brass to experiment with. Soon I went from piercing metal with my saw to soldering pieces.
These days the studio, an extra bedroom in our home, is set up with tools, supplies, and a whole lot of chaos at any given time. I love going up there to experiment on new ideas, or to try to make sketches come to life. Many of my designs are minimal, but true to my roots I still make pieces that are more bold, too. Through all of these changes my mom has been right alongside me cheering me on and wearing my pieces.