“Local jewelry maker creates one-of-a-kind designs”

Local jewelry maker creates one-of-a-kind designs

Posted: 09 Feb 2011 03:03 AM PST

Style: Designer uses new art medium called art clay silver

Thandi Fletcher/OWW

Local jewelry designer Maureen McElhinney aims to make unique pieces one can't find in stores.

Surrounded by sparkly beads, a jar of vintage buttons, dozens of intricate tools and a blowtorch, a local jewelry designer hammers at a silver loop in her brightly yellow-painted basement studio.

Her latest creative experiment, Maureen McElhinney is attempting to perfect the silver bracelets she has pictured in her mind over the past few days. All her designs start that way, being mulled over and over until she has a vision of how the piece should look and how she can achieve the design.

With inspirational phrases engraved along the side, the bracelets are certainly one of a kind, like everything McElhinney designs.

An Okotoks resident, McElhinney works for a printing company by day, still expressing her creative side. But by night, she takes her inventiveness to another level with her jewelry design company, Mack Designs.

McElhinney dabbled in making her own jewelry for years, but had never intended to turn it into a business.

"But when I met my husband, he bought me this beautiful bracelet, and I thought, 'Oh, I could make that,'" she explained. "And that's how it started."

Seven years later, McElhinney is the owner and creative mind behind the company.

Today, she does custom designs for groups, like bridal parties, and sells pieces online. Clothing and jewelry store Ginger Laurier in Okotoks' Olde Towne also carries some of McElhinney's pieces.

The goal is always to design jewelry that isn't commonly found in stores, McElhinney said.

"I find it hard to find unique pieces in stores that speak to me," she said. "(By designing my own jewelry) I get to make one of a kind pieces that nobody else is wearing. Pieces that are unique to me, and that I don't see on everybody walking down the street."

McElhinney said the success of her business has relied mostly on word of mouth, adding her jewelry appeals mostly to customers with a liking for bold designs.

"(My jewelry is for) people who want something that is a little different and a little creative," she said.

While McElhinney creates many different types of jewelry, art clay silver is her specialty.

Art clay silver a clay-like medium used to make jewelry or beads. The clay mixture, which contains recycled silver particles, can be molded into different shapes just like soft clay. After drying, the piece is then fired using either a kiln or a handheld gas torch, which burns off the clay leaving behind a piece that is 99.99 per cent pure silver.

While art clay silver is a booming trend in the United States, McElhinney said it has not taken off in the same way on Canadian soil. She is one of only about 70 Canadian jewelry designers who experiment with the medium, she estimated.

McElhinney was first introduced to the medium while at a gem show in Tucson, Arizona.

"In one of the booths, I saw this art clay and I took a little 15-minute course and became hooked on the novelty of it," she recalled.

Later on, McElhinney took a more advanced certification course in art clay silver jewelry design in Chicago. Her expertise has allowed to her to lead workshops, by request, on how to make art clay silver jewelry, which she said she finds incredibly rewarding.

"It's nice to teach it to women and see the enjoyment they get out of making something for themselves," McElhinney said.

The intricacy of making art clay silver jewelry pieces definitely warrants a lesson or two. Timing is one of the most challenging aspects of working with the medium, McElhinney said.

"It's quite a bit like pottery clay, but it dries fast so you have to work with it quickly," she said.

Another obstacle, which can be dangerous, is firing the clay, she said. If the clay contains too much moisture, the piece can explode while under the torch.

During the creative process, McElhinney said she draws her inspiration from the world around her. Vintage buttons, of which McElhinney has an extensive collection, inspired many of her designs.

"I get inspired from a lot of different places. It could be something in fashion or something in nature," she said.

"Sometimes, if I have an idea in my head, I think it should look a certain way, but when I put it together it's not quite that way," she added. "Sometimes it's a few prototypes before you get it. It just makes you try again."

That seems to be the case for her silver bracelet project.

Continuing to hammer away at the pieces, McElhinney experiences an Einstein moment.

She grabs a jar of liver of sulfur and dabs at the bracelet's surface. A smoky patina forms on the silver as the oxidization process takes place, allowing the engraved letters on the sides to suddenly "pop" with a contrasting glossy finish.

To outsiders, her bracelet may seem complete. But for McElhinney, ever the perfectionist, this is just one step in her design. There is still a lot of experimenting ahead before she perfects her creative vision.

tfletcher@okotoks.greatwest.ca

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