Jewelry Specialization: Mastering Design and Photography Techniques

Yulia Sherbak is an embroidery artist from Cleveland, Ohio. What started as a creative outlet quickly became her career path. After building an online following within the embroidery community, she opened her own Etsy shop, Moss and Feather, where she’s enjoyed commercial success.

Her work is centered on miniature embroidery and needlework jewelry and accessories. She is passionate about animals and nature, which are the main motifs in her work, and the inspiration behind her vegan lifestyle.

Sue McLeary is a floral designer, artist, and writer based in the US. She discovered her passion for floristry after stepping in to arrange flowers at a friend’s wedding and has since dedicated her career to creating art with flowers, a medium she loves for its reminder to stay present.

A recognised designer for floral wearables, Sue has won several awards for her work and was placed second in the Fusion Flowers International Designer of the Year competition in 2015. She has also been featured in several publications including [i]Martha Stewart Weddings[i], and [i]Cosmopolitan[i], and released a book in 2020 about wearable flowers.

Freya, a Glasgow-based jewelry designer, has been making things for as long as she can remember. From doll’s house ornaments to origami, she’s experimented creatively with interiors, textiles, ceramics and sculpture. After initially studying graphic design, she discovered that making things by hand was her true passion and transferred to Glasgow School of Art where she studied jewelry and silversmithing for four years. After graduating, she worked in retail, mastering the art of wholesaling whilst selling her jewelry on the side. Then, in 2019, Freya set up her own business and took her passion project full-time.

Now she sells her pieces online as well as in shops, galleries, and markets. She sees her work as an ever-evolving collection and is committed to using sustainable materials and tackling fast fashion by creating jewelry her customers can wear for years to come.

Gabriela Silveira is a Brazilian photographer specializing in digital content for jewelry, cosmetics, and homeware. Although she always enjoyed taking photographs, her real journey as a photographer began when she moved to Scotland at just 19. Though she touched on still life photography at university, she decided to pursue a career in fashion photography instead. Her job at a clothing brand led to her to photograph jewelry for e-commerce and eventually went freelance. Her relationship with Laboratory Perfume brought her full circle back to still life photography.

Nowadays, she uses a combination of the conceptual and theoretical skills she learned from her master’s with the experimental freestyle approach she got from art school, where she learned to step outside her comfort zone and tame her inner perfectionist. Her work explores themes like love, beauty, and death, with flowers and flesh often featuring heavily.

Alicia Goodwin is a Chicago-based contemporary jeweler who specializes in wax carving. She discovered the art of jewelry-making as a child, but didn’t realize it was her true calling until years later while earning a degree in jewelry design. During her studies, she fell in love with the wax modeling technique, which allows her to easily explore new shapes, styles, and textures to craft truly unique accessories.

Several years after graduation, Alicia started her own jewelry line, Lingua Nigra, which is both a reflection of her influences and a look to the future. Throughout her career, she has collaborated with small designers as well as big-name brands, including Juicy Couture, Nine West, Vince Camuto, and Kate Spade. Her pieces have also been featured in the Divine Legacies in Black Jewelry collection at the National Ornamental Metal Museum of America.

Mayumi Fukuda is a Japanese Brazilian paper jeweler based in Leipzig, Germany. She studied jewelry design at the Centro de Joalharia de Lisboa, and has attended a variety of jewelry and paper making courses in Japan, UK and Germany.

In 2013, she started Mayumi Origami, a jewelry brand that designs their pieces with high-quality Japanese Chiyogami silkscreen paper. Her collections can be found in museums shops across Europe such as the British Museum in the UK, Orient Museum in Portugal, and CODA Museum in the Netherlands. In 2018 and 2019, she was invited to lead workshops exploring the Origami jewelry field at the West Dean College in the UK and at the Papierwerk Glockenbach in Germany.