I spent a long time trying to do things the "correct" way. I looked at seasonal must-haves and those corporate trend reports that tell you exactly which shades of blue or green the world is supposed to want six months from now. I thought that was what it meant to be a professional jewelry designer. I thought if I followed the market, I was building something sustainable.
But looking back, I was just turning myself into a machine.
Designing to catch a trend is a hollow, exhausting way to live. It’s like trying to solve a puzzle that doesn't have a soul, chasing a moving target that you didn't even choose. I eventually hit a wall where I realized that if I don’t love a piece—if I don’t feel a visceral, physical pull toward it—it simply shouldn't exist. If a design isn't authentic to my own eye first, it’s never going to mean anything to yours.
The connection starts long before I ever begin the physical work. It starts with a feeling for a color palette that comes from a very deep, quiet space. It isn't about what looks "nice" together in a textbook or on a color wheel. I don't pick colors because they’re "in style." I have to feel them in my gut.
It’s a specific frequency. Sometimes I’ll sit at my table with a handful of stones, and even if they are objectively perfect, they just sit there. If they don’t "hum" at the same frequency as the idea in my head, I can’t work with them. I’ve tried to force it before—trying to make a high-value stone fit a design just because it was the "correct" choice on paper. The result always felt cold. It lacked that spark of life that makes jewelry more than just a bit of decoration.
This is why I’ve become so slow and intentional with the stones I choose. Every stone has a vibration. Some feel sharp and energetic; others feel grounded, almost heavy. If that vibration doesn't align with my own energy while I'm at the table, the whole thing stalls.
When I’m in the middle of a complicated design, the materials and I are in a conversation. If I’m trying to force an idea onto a stone that doesn't want to be there, everything fights back. The proportions feel clumsy. The balance is off. But when the vibration is right—when the color palette matches whatever is happening inside me—the work flows. The mental noise I usually carry starts to quiet down because the connection is finally leading the way.
I’ve had to make a hard pivot. I’ve stopped worrying about whether a piece is "commercial" or if it fits into a certain category. Now, the only metric that matters is that feeling. I have to be the first person to fall in love with what I’m making.
I’m designing for an audience of one.
It might seem like a strange way to run a business, but I believe it’s the only way to make something that actually lasts. If I create based on a trend, I’m giving you something that will feel dated by next year. If I create from that deep space of color and vibration, I’m giving you a piece of my own clarity.
My hope is that you’ll feel that same vibration when a piece finally lands in your hands. If I’m not moved by the work at my table, I can't expect you to be moved by it when you wear it. So, I’m done with the industry noise. I’m staying at the table until the vibration is right.
This practice of designing for myself first—of living in the jewelry to ensure it carries the right weight and light—is why I keep a master journal in the studio. It is a private, evolving book of color and inspiration that I use to ground my creative process at the workbench. I eventually pulled several essential chapters from those journals to create The Color Mood Book, so I could share that roadmap with you.
While The Color Mood Book is available in the studio shop ($27), I wanted to share a specific piece of that story today. Since I’ve been relying so much on the clarity of water-inspired tones lately, I’ve pulled the "Waterfall and Blue Grass" palette from the book as a gift for those who follow along with these weekly journals. It is a study in how refreshing Turquoise and deep Sapphire can ground us, even when we are miles from the shore.
If these Waterfall tones resonate with you, I have gathered the jewelry currently available in these Sapphire and Turquoise hues here.
If you find that these color stories help you see your own jewelry collection in a new light, you can find the complete Color Mood Book in the studio shop. It includes the other primary palettes I live by—from the warmth of Roasted Pecan to the intensity of Beaujolais.