After a voice told artist Karen Smith she’d go to Senegal, she went. Apprenticing there with a master goldsmith, she was watched constantly but silently by a young girl. “She thinks you’re a ghost,” someone finally told Karen. “She’s never seen a woman do what you’re doing.” In response, in 2019 Karen launched We Wield the Hammer in Oakland, CA, determined to empower young women of African descent to wield all the tools and equipment in a good jewelry studio, and launch their own businesses, too...
Apr 28, 2022•34 min
Each year in January and February, people gather in Tucson, Arizona to buy and sell beads, gems, and other treasures from around the world. There are over 40 shows in different venues across the city, all with their own flavor. To me, the experience feels like part shopping adventure, learning experience, and family reunion. While I was in Tucson, I caught up with Lenka Bindzar, the owner of Raven's Journey, who has been traveling to Tucson to sell Czech glass beads for the past two decades. Sho...
Mar 23, 2022•14 min•Season 5Ep. 33
Known for his stunning jewelry designs featuring rough diamonds, innovative artisan jeweler Todd Reed has been redefining luxury and championing ethical sourcing throughout his career. Turning the notion of fine jewelry on its head, he is drawn to these uncut, unpolished diamond crystals for the quirkiness of their personalities. From the perfect simplicity of a single cube to a busy crystal cluster bristling with different shapes, he finds raw diamonds fascinating and provocative. He also loves...
Feb 17, 2022•32 min•Season 5Ep. 33
Tracy Matthews is a jewelry designer, entrepreneur, and Chief Visionary Officer of Flourish & Thrive Academy. She's also the host of the top-rated Thrive By Design Podcast. Tracy's new book, The Desired Brand Effect, is packed with strategies, steps, real-life stories, and resources to help you build your jewelry business – or any business. In this episode, Tracy shares suggestions for visionary leadership, alternative business plans, and more. Learn more here: https://www.interweave.com/jew...
Jan 19, 2022•37 min•Season 5Ep. 32
Jean Gribbon founded and directs Beads of Courage, Inc., an innovative arts-in-medicine nonprofit that supports children coping with serious illness, as well as their families and health care providers. Members receive colorful glass beads during the course of their treatment, which provides a connection between the child, clinician, and caring community. In this episode, we talk about the intersection between art and science – and why experiencing art and making things is good for us. Learn mor...
Dec 17, 2021•33 min•Season 4Ep. 31
Robin Kramer has the industry experience and unique ability to look at an artist’s work and recommend practical steps they can take to improve their business. She started Red Boot Consulting in 2010 and co-founded Flourish & Thrive Academy for jewelry designers in 2012. In this episode, Robin and host Katie Hacker talk about mentoring and being mentored, along with tips for growing your business. Learn more about Robin: https://www.interweave.com/jewelry-artist-podcast/jewelry-artist-robin-k...
Nov 16, 2021•35 min•Season 4Ep. 30
The first time I met Susan Lenart was in a cold connections workshop at an art retreat. Her class blew my mind – she taught us to infuse found objects, wire, hand tools, and other jewelry-making bits and pieces with kinetic energy - but to attend to them with intense focus and skill. It was like a journey we all went on together, with Susan as our guide. In addition to being an accomplished artist and jeweler, Susan is also an author, instructor, and expert at product development. In this episod...
Oct 20, 2021•40 min•Season 4Ep. 29
Anie Piliguian grew up at the jeweler’s bench, learning a can-do attitude and meticulous skills from her father. She credits him for teaching her not to fear anything at the bench. Since inventing the JOOLTOOL, her focus has been on teaching jewelers everything she knows so they can make jewelry successfully. As a lifelong maker, she continues to improve her own work and finds that she frequently learns as much from her students and she hopes they’re learning from her. Listen in for a peek a beh...
Sep 23, 2021•41 min•Season 4Ep. 28
Moving parts intrigue Kieu Pham Gray, she tells host Katie Hacker. Kieu loves figuring out how to make things happen, from engineering kinetic jewelry that’s meant to be played with to pivoting her business model. Leaving the corporate world behind nearly 20 years ago because she “didn’t fit the mold,” Kieu has been an active jewelry entrepreneur ever since. She’s a jewelry artist, teacher, retail supplier, and event promoter. When Covid shut down her in-person teaching, she was online with a co...
Aug 18, 2021•45 min•Season 4Ep. 28
“Hi, I’m the jewelry designer for The Guiding Light,” a struggling jewelry artist named Jill MacKay once announced in the luxury department store Bergdorf Goodman. As she tells long-time friend and host Katie Hacker, early on Jill had decided TV would be a good way to get exposure for her brand, and it was. Now an award-winning craft industry figure, Jill has devoted equal effort to jewelry and helping others, developing creative programs for those in grief, and giving back through public art. L...
Jul 22, 2021•43 min•Season 4Ep. 27
“You’re shy — so are they,” says polymer clay artist Christi Friesen about making a career of your art, acknowledging how hard it can be to put yourself out there. As she tells Jewelry Artist podcast host Katie Hacker, “We’re always selling ourselves: a piece of our heart, our hand, our brain.” But it’s important to do it and connect with people any way you can, Christi advises. Drawn to her medium first for its super range of colors, she also considers its easy workability and low cost an invit...
Jun 16, 2021•42 min•Season 3Ep. 26
Join host Katie Hacker for an inspiring conversation with Beadwork magazine’s featured Bead Artist Melissa Grakowsky-Shippee. Melissa is known for her elaborate masks and intricate yet ethereal beadwork. An award-winning designer, Melissa has written books, taught internationally, and was a 2017 Beadwork Designer of the Year. Melissa draws in beaders with her methodical approach to artistic designs. We’ll talk about Melissa’s art, business, and creative life.
Jun 06, 2021•52 sec•Season 3Ep. 25
Why not try it? When Kathy Cano-Murillo thinks up a new craft twist, she jumps in — especially if she hears it’ll never work. Usually she succeeds, carried along by her own glittering cascade of exuberant experimentation. Listen to host Katie Hacker’s lively conversation with the woman known professionally as The Crafty Chica, dedicated to creating, teaching, and sharing all things craft. Join them in a nonstop audio party about making and selling jewelry and other decorative objects in resin, c...
May 12, 2021•35 min•Season 3Ep. 24
“I should have been a business major!” Kate Richbourg was recently out of college and facing the classic artist’s dilemma. As she tells host Katie Hacker, Kate realized she needed a way of pursuing what she loved without living so close to the economic edge. Trying new things, she discovered that jewelry brought out her creativity best. Today Kate is well known in the bead and metal communities for both her inspiring lessons and designs. Her instructor persona is driven to explore the newest tec...
Apr 14, 2021•44 min•Season 3Ep. 23
We originally released this episode in August 2020, but the topic is more relevant than ever. Katie Hacker speaks with Carrie Cleveland, Education and Outreach Manager for the Craft Emergency Relief Fund. The artist’s safety net for over 35 years, CERF+ launched its special Covid-19 response earlier last summer with one-time $1,000 grants for urgent needs. Find out more about its Covid program, its longstanding emergency relief, and its more recent focus on preparedness. Learn how CERF+ can help...
Mar 25, 2021•39 min•Season 3Ep. 22
Known for his stunning jewelry designs featuring rough diamonds, innovative artisan jeweler Todd Reed has been redefining luxury and championing ethical sourcing throughout his career. Turning the notion of fine jewelry on its head, he is drawn to these uncut, unpolished diamond crystals for the quirkiness of their personalities. From the perfect simplicity of a single cube to a busy crystal cluster bristling with different shapes, he finds raw diamonds fascinating and provocative. He also loves...
Feb 03, 2021•31 min•Season 2Ep. 21
Seeing nature’s treasures in their natural environments, never before seen by another human, is an amazing privilege, crystal and fossil hunter John Cornish relates. It can also be a little oasis of calm and refreshment anyone can enjoy or remember when life’s craziness gets to be too much. Join host Katie Hacker for this upbeat and down-to-earth exploration of the mineral kingdom with this consummate collector. Hear how John’s passion for rocks has grown into his life’s work and a passion for s...
Jan 07, 2021•36 min•Season 2Ep. 20
Prized for its blues, greens, and ever-varying patterns of distinctive matrix, turquoise is among the most popular of gemstones and has been for thousands of years. Think turquoise today, and Native American jewelry comes quickly to mind — and vice versa. Join host Katie Hacker for an exploration into these iconic treasures of the American Southwest with veteran fan and trader Pete Leyba. Pete has spent a lifetime in and around New Mexico in the jewelry business, soaking up knowledge of it all a...
Dec 09, 2020•35 min•Season 2Ep. 19
Sarah Cathcart hand fashions elaborate and arresting leather masks one at a time, an art that grew out of her experience as a theatrical costume designer. But, she tells host Katie Hacker, “Masks are so niche — or were until 2020,” she adds wryly. “Sort of face jewelry, but not something you’d wear too much.” So she drew upon her favorite medium and “hodgepodge magpie collection of skills” to produce handmade jewelry you’d wear more often, too. Hear what inspires this self-proclaimed “Renaissanc...
Nov 25, 2020•38 min•Season 2Ep. 17
It’s the challenge of making that interests Robert Lopez and drives him toward ever bigger and bolder jewelry designs. He thrives on figuring out the engineering of complex pieces, and sometimes develops his own tools to meet his particular needs. That’s today, but while teaching himself metalsmithing he used whatever was at hand: a construction hammer or a plumber’s torch, learning to make what he wanted however he could. Although he’s since discovered purpose-made jewelry tools (“a whole new w...
Nov 11, 2020•41 min•Season 2Ep. 16
Listen in with host Katie Hacker as artisan jewelry entrepreneur Kristen Baird shares her secret to success. The minute she learned about the Red Backpack Fund, she started her application, completed it that day, and became one of the first to be awarded a $5,000 grant. When Covid-19 hit, she’d already been improving her online infrastructure, then invested her award into making it easier to pivot from storefront to virtual business. Now she’s tapping in especially to the trend in repurposing he...
Oct 28, 2020•40 min•Season 2Ep. 15
After a voice told artist Karen Smith she’d go to Senegal, she went. Apprenticing there with a master goldsmith, she was watched constantly but silently by a young girl. “She thinks you’re a ghost,” someone finally told Karen. “She’s never seen a woman do what you’re doing.” In response, in 2019 Karen launched We Wield the Hammer in Oakland, CA, determined to empower young women of African descent to wield all the tools and equipment in a good jewelry studio, and launch their own businesses, too...
Oct 14, 2020•34 min•Season 2Ep. 14
Overnight, Francesca Watson began developing her online jewelry program in earnest. When COVID-19 struck, her teaching studio already offered some tutorials online, but The Makery had been all about learning in person. Suddenly, online was her only real option. Since then, she’s worked out a lot more bugs and now plays host to over 1,500 remote students who tune in regularly. The experience has been disruptive but energizing, she tells host Katie Hacker, and Francesca is now “1000% committed” to...
Sep 30, 2020•46 min•Season 2Ep. 13
Kate Wolf has three loves: carving wax, designing tools, and teaching. All three center around creating wax models for jewelry casting. Today she’s focusing a lot on tool design and developing online workshops to replace the live classes she’s had to suspend but really, really misses. Once she starts working in wax, though, there’s nothing like its state of easy concentration or the wild ride of jewelry design she still finds exciting after more than 40 years. Join host Katie Hacker for their co...
Sep 16, 2020•42 min•Season 2Ep. 12
Inlay artist Jeff Fulkerson gives every surface of his jewelry special attention, whether it’s visible when worn or not. Comparing this art to painting with rocks, he says the best part about learning to cut stone is creating your own palette of color and shape. He advises studying techniques so you can apply what you learn any way you want, and combining them to develop your signature style. Listen in with host Katie Hacker, who describes Jeff’s work as simply beautiful from every angle. See ou...
Sep 02, 2020•38 min•Season 2Ep. 11
The artist’s safety net for over 35 years, the Craft Emergency Relief Fund launched its special Covid-19 response earlier this summer: one-time $1,000 grants for urgent needs. Deadline for the current cycle of awards is September 9, 2020. Listen to host Katie Hacker’s conversation with Carrie Cleveland, Education and Outreach Manager for CERF+, and discover or get re-acquainted with this amazing organization. Find out more about its Covid program, its longstanding emergency relief, and its more ...
Aug 26, 2020•39 min•Season 2Ep. 10
A lover of knowledge and understanding, Charles Lewton-Brain is best known for inventing the metalsmithing technique of foldforming. He is also an award-winning art jeweler, a master goldsmith, a prolific author, and a dynamic jewelry instructor, and occupies a singular place in jewelry today. Listen in as he shares tales of discovery with host Katie Hacker, embracing simplicity, innovation, and the concept shared by an indigenous Canadian elder that “education is the new buffalo.” Learn more an...
Aug 19, 2020•27 min•Season 2Ep. 9
She’s done it all. Jewelry tool inventor, marketing maven, trend spotter, and art jeweler Brenda Schweder has learned to balance doing what she loves and contributing to the family income. Her passion: making jewelry from found objects and steel wire, and figuring out the engineering to put them together. Listen in as she tells host Katie Hacker her secrets for ensuring daily creative studio time while always remaining open to new possibilities. See our show notes and photos of Brenda's work: ht...
Aug 05, 2020•36 min•Season 2Ep. 8
Joe Silvera loves to teach jewelry making. He started by helping undergrads when he was a grad student, and when he went back to it, felt that he had come home..He’s taught at shows and craft fairs, in his own Bay Area jewelry school, and online. Join host Katie Hacker as they talk metalsmithing at home and in other small spaces, and discover the Silvera secret to a successful couples business. See our show notes here: https://www.interweave.com/jewelry-artist-podcast/jewelry-artist-podcast-joe-...
Jul 22, 2020•37 min•Season 2Ep. 7
As an art student, Mark Nelson had a job cleaning and maintaining the jewelry lab. When he finally decided to take a jewelry making class, his teacher told him he was pretty good at it and should change his major. He did, and never looked back. He’s made a career of figuring out how to make things work, and today is jewelry supplier Rio Grande’s Education Coordinator. Learn more about just how innovative and resourceful Mark’s “pretty good” approach to jewelry is. From design and fabrication to ...
Jun 24, 2020•35 min•Season 1Ep. 6
