About the Artist
I grew up in Wisconsin, drawn early to making things by hand — the satisfaction of starting with raw material and ending with something that hadn't existed before. It wasn't until I discovered flameworking and fused glass in my twenties that everything clicked. There was something about fire and glass together, the way a piece could shift in seconds from rigid to liquid and back, that felt alive in a way nothing else had.
Metal followed naturally. The hammering, the annealing, the way copper and silver hold a mark — it complemented everything I loved about glass, giving my work structure and weight where glass brings color and light. Today my pieces weave the two: fused glass set in hand-formed metal, or torch-worked beads strung into jewelry you can wear every day.
Door County is my studio and my muse. The peninsula's light is unlike anywhere I've been — how it comes off the bay in the morning, how the water shifts from silver to green to deep blue depending on the clouds and the hour. That quality of light shows up in every color palette I reach for, every gradient I pull from a rod.
The festivals are where the work finds its people. There's a moment I live for at every show: when someone picks up a piece, goes quiet for a beat, and then looks up. That pause is what I'm making for. I want my work to slow things down, to remind you that something beautiful and handmade exists in the world — made right here, in Door County, with care.
In the Studio
Every piece begins at the torch or the kiln. The studio is a small, bright space where glass rods and sheet metal share shelf space, where the smell of flux mingles with the faint warmth of a kiln finishing a slow anneal. It is a working place — not precious, just purposeful — and that energy makes its way into whatever comes out of it.
The process is rarely fast. A single fused pendant might go through the kiln twice before the colors settle the way I want them. A metal setting gets filed and refined until the glass sits inside it the way a stone sits in good jewelry — held, not trapped. I'd rather spend the extra hour and get it right than rush a piece out the door.