Creative Bloom | Volume 7: Stories from Artists

✨ Introducing Creative Bloom—our new series celebrating emerging artists where creativity and soulful expression come together. 🌱 Each week, we’ll shine a light on a talented artist and their inspiring work. If you’d like to support their journey, feel free to “Buy Me a Coffee” and show them some love.

I’m a maker. I live to create. It’s not a lofty impulse or a fleeting inspiration- it’s the steady rhythm of who I am. Nothing is too ordinary to catch my attention. I notice the natural nook in a boulder and tuck moss into it to grow. I pocket stones from my path, drawn to their shape, their weight, their quiet stubbornness. A twisted branch, a curve of driftwood, a piece of steel salvaged from the metal yard; these are the raw sparks of my work. 

Nature inspires me, and in turn, I create pieces that don’t try to dominate it but to sit alongside it; juxtaposed yet belonging. A shard of fused glass catching sunlight in a garden, a column of steel standing rooted among trees, a stone that once lay unnoticed, now transformed into a focal point. These materials call out, and I answer with my hands, my tools, my willingness to see what they could become. 

Although I love working with a wide range of mediums, right now I’m immersed in fused glass, raw steel, stone, and driftwood. These hold sway over me, but I’m never limited. My past experiments slip back into the present when they’re needed. I used to fold tiny origami cranes by hand, one after another, paper into flight. Recently, I welded one out of steel - a simple shape, but one that carried all the memory of where I began, remade in the language I speak now. 

Where I am today is somewhere between grit and vision. My garage is crowded with tools, scraps, kilns, and half-finished pieces. It’s not ideal, but it’s alive with possibility. Every corner holds a project in motion; every surface dusted with sparks and shards. 

This space sustains me, but it also reminds me that I need more room to grow. Lying quietly in my mind’s eye is my dream of taking flight - of launching a space that houses my creations alongside a garden gallery that is both inviting and enticing. A place where sculpture and nature speak to one another, where visitors can wander paths, pause among trees, and stumble upon art that feels as though it grew there on its own. 

For now, I’m counting pennies, hoping that enough will pave my path toward this dream haven. I’m breathing life into it by speaking of it, by shaping it in words and in work, mindfully willing myself closer. I don’t know how or when it will happen, but I trust that the act of creating, the steady rhythm of making, will carry me into it. And if the universe is listening, perhaps it will meet me halfway.