We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Tanya Stiegler a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Tanya, thanks for joining us today. If you could go back in time do you wish you had started your creative career sooner or later?
My jewelry career started with a beginning metalsmithing class at home in PA, the summer after my freshman year in college. The college I went to in NC didn’t have a metal shop, so I then sought out a self-employed local designer/jeweler for an internship. After the internship, I worked for her part-time until graduation from college, then full-time until her business hit a lull and she could no longer afford to keep me employed. I saw what a challenge it could be to own a small business, all of the hats she wore as a business owner, and how time-consuming some of them could be (dealing with tax issues and the IRS for instance). While she was a great teacher and mentor and taught me a great deal, that experience scared me away from wanting to own my own business for a very long time. I spent about 20 years working in the jewelry industry, mostly as a bench jeweler, before making the leap to start my own jewelry business which is now entering its 8th year. It still took a lot of courage to take that step, but I knew if I didn’t, I would never be able to really explore my artistic vision and would have felt a lot of regret about that. Sometimes I wish I started my business sooner, but the experience gained and connections made during those 20 years have really helped me with running my business today.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers
My family has had a big influence on my creative business. My mom has always been artistic, and so it was second nature for me to make things and create as a child. Mom was also into gardening, becoming a Master Gardener while I was growing up, and my dad was an “amateur nurseryman.” He burned up a whole roll of film taking pictures of mushrooms once during a childhood vacation. So being outside and appreciating the natural world became a core part of who I am too.
My interest in jewelry began at an early age, as I grew up playing with my great-grandmother’s sparkly rhinestone jewelry that had been handed down to me. I took a beginning metalsmithing class one summer while in college, then followed it up with an internship where I went to school ( I was an art major but my college didn’t have a metals shop.) From there, I continued to work for the artist providing the internship, then worked in a series of retail jewelry stores as a bench jeweler. During this time, jewelry workshops fed my creative side, as did pursuing my own designs as time allowed. I applied to a graduate program for jewelry and metals years ago and was accepted, but life took a different turn and I wound up not going.
For the past seven years, I’ve had my own business where I design and create fine, nature-inspired jewelry from precious metals and gemstones. One of the lines I currently produce is cast from grapevine tendrils that I find in nature into solid metal and often accent with gemstones and pearls. The pieces from my Tendrils series are wearable little sculptures. My Fizz series, inspired by water, is great for everyday wear yet also a perfect choice for a night out.
It’s really important to me that jewelry is designed well. I work to create pieces that are beautiful from any angle, comfortable to wear, and made with careful consideration being given to choice of materials, balance, and weight. I don’t like for clasps and mechanisms to be obvious and integrate those into my designs as much as possible. My jewelry takes time to make and is meant to be timeless: treasured over the years and passed down to loved ones.
I also really enjoy creating custom designs, which can either be based on the designs I produce independently or they can go in a completely different direction. My 27+ years working in the jewelry business mean I have a lot of experience with styles, materials and techniques to draw upon to create something truly one-of-a-kind. Often a design will start with stones that a client has and would like to enjoy wearing, or we can sift through the sparkly goodies I have on hand, or I will explore my sources for the perfect gem. Custom designs often celebrate or commemorate something or someone very important. It is incredibly rewarding for me to get to do this work with a client and often friend, working with them to tell their life’s story in a very unique way. I am so grateful for these opportunities!
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
For me, the most rewarding aspect of being an artist/creative is playing with the duality of discovery and longevity. I love spending time in nature and bringing back tokens of that experience: pebbles, empty shells, driftwood, or tendils, for example. I’m excited by that “Oooh!” moment when I first discover a treasure, and am also deeply gratified by the ongoing relationship created by experiencing it in my home or yard. I feel like my best work re-creates this experience: the initial “Wow! This is gorgeous!” followed by a satisfying, deepening relationship with a piece of my jewelry as it is worn and enjoyed over time.
Have you ever had to pivot?
This is difficult for me to talk about, and it’s a story I don’t share often. Fairly early on in my career as a bench jeweler, the head jeweler at the store where I was working decided suddenly and unexpectedly that he didn’t want to interact with me any more. At all! I did everything I could think of to deal with the situation, from trying to talk with him about it, to ignoring him (which was really hard in such a small shop), to talking with management. Nothing worked and eventually I was let go to solve the uncomfortable atmosphere that had developed. The head jeweler was part of a strongly male-dominated culture. I thought I had unknowingly done something to deeply offend him, and he had friends and relatives working as goldsmiths at most of the other local jewelry stores. I was really worried that this experience would re-play itself if I tried to work at another store, so I left the jewelry industry and went to work for a local kayak manufacturer. A few years later, I followed the kayak manufacturer to another state when it relocated, and then decided to return to working as a bench jeweler. I came to find out that the jeweler who refused to talk to me convinced the store owner to hire his brother as my replacement. Perhaps that was his goal all along. But it’s interesting to me now to look back and see that even though that was a tough experience, it led to some life choices I might not have had otherwise.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.tanyastieglerdesigns.com
- Instagram: @tanyastieglerdesigns
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tanyastieglerdesigns
Image Credits
Photo of hands with torch and flame: credit Kevin Harrington Images Last four images of jewelry: credit Philip Garcia