We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Chelsea Lea a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Chelsea, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Parents can play a significant role in affecting how our lives and careers turn out – and so we think it’s important to look back and have conversations about what our parents did that affected us positive (or negatively) so that we can learn from the billions of experiences in each generation. What’s something you feel your parents did right that impacted you positively.
My mom is a jewelry designer and works professionally as a jeweler for a company in Atlanta. Before this she owned her own gallery and I grew up in that environment and she taught me from a young age how to work in the store with her. She taught me everything from a young age, I went to the post office, made the bank deposits, and cleaned and organized the store. She had her store from 1991 to 2014, and I helped her close the gallery which was very hard for both of us.
I learned so much about business, and the jewelry industry from being raised this way. This experience has had a huge influence on my approach to business and what I hope to achieve as an artist. I appreciate all the hard work my mom made me do both paid and unpaid for our family business.
Since I am a third generation jeweler it is important for me to always give thanks to my family for passing these skills and knowledge forward to me. I often work with tools that were passed down to me from my mother and grandmother. Most of my hammers belonged to my grandmother and I find a deep sense of connection when working with these ancestral tools.
I have honored this heritage by my YouTube videos about this history. Please check out me YouTube channel to see more about these tools that I have inherited.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
Chelsea Lea Metals was founded in Wilmington NC in 2016 as a jewelry line. I have expanded into a space which offers classes to beginner metalsmiths and also teach lost wax casting classes. I have gained skills from my mother who owned a jewelry gallery in downtown Athens GA where I grew up. I also learned a lot from my grandmother who taught jewelry design at Troy State University in Troy AL. I have a BFA in jewelry design from the University of Georgia class of 2013, and most recently an MFA in film studies from the University of North Carolina Wilmington. During the past 3 years while earning my MFA I was also running my own jewelry studio and continuing to produce my own line of jewelry for Chelsea Lea Metals.
My studio offers repair services, custom design, and beginner and intermediate jewelry classes. I am passionate about teaching and hope to expand my classroom in the future.
I am also very passionate about custom design and enjoy the lost wax casting process. I make custom engagement rings in gold, silver, and platinum. I look forward to growing my business through the custom design process and experiences.
Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?
When I moved to Wilmington NC in 2014 I did not know a single person in the city. I was really eager to start my own brand and start selling my jewelry locally. I started applying for local craft shows and was selected regularly as an exhibiting artist. After a few years I began outgrowing the market scene, but made a lot of important connections from doing these types of events. That is how I met so many of artists and galleries would shop these events and often that was how I got my work into new gallery spaces.
Networking at other events around town also help to build my presence in the Wilmington NC community.
I also worked at a notable jewelry store in Wilmington and was featured in a lot of their television advertisements and a lot of people still recognize me from that. Being part of another jewelry store gave me a trustworthy reputation in the local jewelry industry.
Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?
I have been pivoting since I started my business in 2016. I have started to grow very organically but not forcing anything or getting too far ahead of myself financially. Although I would like to work for myself full time I have had multiple jobs in jewelry repair shops in Wilmington NC. This has allowed me to make strong connections in the local industry, and has taught me a lot about fine jewelry and sales. I hope to become more independent and fully go into business for myself in the near future.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.chelsealeametals.com
- Instagram: ChelseaLeaMetals
- Facebook: ChelseaLeaMetals
- Youtube: @chelsealea6053
- Other: Link to Youtube film about my heritage tools: https://youtu.be/mPy2s1_razw?si=eQmUcBlIJHH8QDQb
Image Credits
All pictures by Chelsea Lea