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Designer/Goldsmith Chris
Keenan's newest design! This exquisitely detailed oak leaf
ring evokes a peaceful fall evening in the woods with its
serene blue sapphire cabochon and twinkling diamonds. Keep
watch for Chris' next oak ring, featuring a pear-shaped
cabochon ruby…it is coming soon!
Congratulations to our in house designer/goldsmith, Whitney
Robinson for winning Jewelers Choice Award at the WJA
Jewelry Show this year! This is her award winning piece
“Emerald Isle”.
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Garcelle Beauvais wore Crevoshay at the 71st Annual Golden
Globe Awards! Congratulations Paula!
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It is well-known that at Studio Jewelers we all adore the
genius work of Alex Sepkus. Here is a piece that Hanna
wrote last year about the ‘other genius’ involved: Alex’s
business parter, Jeff. We thought it would make an
interesting read for any admirers of Alex’s work.
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We had so many
wonderful gems at our annual Opal Sale this
May!
From Cleopatra to Queen Victoria to Elizabeth Taylor, opal
has captured the imaginations of powerful women throughout
history. Those who came in for the sale got to find out
first-hand why this dazzling gem holds such power. The
photos above show just a few of the many hundreds of opals
that were here at Studio Jewelers just for this special
show;
~Lightning
Ridge black opal- rarest of all!
~Queensland boulder opal, the “drama queen” of Australian
opal
~Matrix boulder opal from the famed Yowah and Koroit fields
~Fire opal and water opal from Mexico
~Crystal and light opal from Australia and Ethiopia
~Pink, blue and green opal from Peru and Tanzania
~Opal bead strands from all over the world
~Doublet opals, all the beauty at a fraction of the price
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We
had a great time at Girl’s Night
Out!
Held
This Year at
The Madison Club
We had a bigger
venue and more bling, but the same awesome prices! Shoppers
enjoyed complimentary champagne cocktails, hors d’ouvres,
and our Filene’s Basement-style trunk show on April 25th at
our 4th annual Girl’s Night Out fundraiser event. We were
hosted by the Madison Club this year, which gave us the
opportunity to add a selection of pearl jewelry in addition
to the diamond and discontinued “bling” beauties that we
regularly feature at this event. Thank
you to all who
attended and helped make it a fun evening!
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Artist
Paula Crevoshay in popular Carnegie Museum exhibit
The
Carnegie Museum mounted a
one-woman show of Paula Crevoshay’s artwork in the
spring of 2013. The exhibit was titled
The Garden of
Light, and
featured works illustrating the energetic and spiritual
symbiosis between the floral, animal, and mineral
kingdoms. Paula has received invitations to further
display the collection, with invitations from museums in
Europe and elsewhere in North America. Paula states that
...“The Garden of
Light is about how the three
kingdoms of the garden come together so beautifully to
create and sustain life. There will be fabulous jewels
depicting members of the Floral, Animal and Mineral
Kingdoms”.
Paula Crevoshay
was a featured artist in the Headley-Whitney Museum’s
exhibit The Cutting
Edge II: Gem and Jewelry Invitational
ran
January 22nd to July 8th. An earlier Crevoshay museum
collection, Beyond
Color, was created
for the inaugural exhibit of the Mary Lou Whitney
decorative arts wing of the museum. Crevoshay’s
Voices of
the Earth exhibit, in
which she showcased the work of top North American gem
cutters and carvers, opened at the Carnegie Museum in 2002
and then traveled to the Gemological Institute of America
and Chicago’s Lizzardo Museum of Lapidary Art.
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1.) Jeff Feero steps out to
admire our trunk show banner. 2.) A small selection of
the special items brought in for the
show.
Alex
Sepkus Trunk Show
October 11th through 13th, 2012
The Alex Sepkus
collection came to Studio Jewelers on October 11th.
Invitees to our special preview event Thursday evening
enjoyed champagne, wine, and other culinary refreshments as
Alex’s new “Pathway” and “Paved Garden” collections were
unveiled. Jeff Feero, Sepkus’ business partner and friend
of Studio Jewelers, was on hand to answer questions and
fill in our knowledge about how each piece is crafted.
Our Alex Sepkus Trunk Shows have become one of our most
highly anticipated special events as more and more people
find out about the beautiful jewels that this unique artist
creates. We saw a lot of sapphire, tourmaline, and jade in
Alex’s latest work. Jeff brought lots of bead neckpieces,
from labradorite to big chunky tourmalines, with the new
clasps Alex has been designing this year.
Every piece Alex
Sepkus makes is a world in miniature, exquisite to the last
detail, such as the micro-textured hammer marks that make
each piece glow. Each ring is a rich, complex design with
an organic element that blends the angles, curves, and
features together in a smooth communion that hints at the
playful, mischievous side of the designer. “I try to make
people recall their memories of beautiful things, some
real, like that old crumbling stone pavement or a field of
grass, but mostly imagined or read about in a book of fairy
tales,” Sepkus says. He attributes to his most loyal
customers a shared enjoyment of poetry and sense of humor,
as these are things he likes to convey in what he calls the
“beautiful and slightly mysterious little things” he
creates.
Eleanor
Moty, “Master Metalsmith”
Eleanor Moty was designated “Master Metalsmith
2012”
by the Metal Museum in Memphis, TN. Seventy
works spanning more than forty years were displayed in
the September 7th to December 2nd, 2012 exhibition.
Framed pages from Eleanor’s sketchbook were displayed
with her pieces to give the audience insight into her
design process. An educational feature was available
showing her design models, background material, and
unique design approach. A forty page catalog picturing
each work was created for the exhibition, and are
available for $8 plus shipping and handling online
at www.metalmuseum.org.
Eleanor also exhibited a brooch in the invitational
exhibition Without Boundaries: Transformation in
American Craft, at the Craft Alliance in
St. Louis, MO. Forty artists whose work was included in
the 1987 exhibition Craft Today, Poetry of
the Physical at New York’s American Craft
Museum were invited to exhibit their current work in
this revisit of the historic venue.
Eleanor Moty’s signature brooches are earrings are in
museums and private collections world-wide,
(and of
course, are available for purchase here at Studio
Jewelers). A feature article about her
work written by Marjorie Simon was published in the January
2012 issue of Metalsmith
magazine, from
the Society of North American
Goldsmiths.
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Fred
Fenster receives honors
In
May, 2012, Fred Fenster was recipient of a
Wisconsin Visual Art Lifetime Achievement
Award. Since 2004, WVALAA has
provided an annual award to artists, patrons, authors,
instructors and institutions who have distinguished
themselves through a lifetime of involvement in the
visual arts, and in a manner which has benefitted the
art culture of our state. The three entities which
created and maintain the annual awards are
The Museum of Wisconsin
Art,
West Bend; the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and
Letters, Madison; and the statewide
organization Wisconsin Visual
Artists, Inc.
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Girls
Night Out Raises $500 for Overture’s Free &
Low-cost Programming
Nearly
a hundred savvy shoppers came out for this year’s
Girls Night
Out trunk show and cocktail party,
enjoying an assortment of hors d’ouvres and a refreshing
beverage or two while snapping up some amazing bargains.
Every year Hanna brings in a vast assortment of “bling” and
fashion jewelry overstocks and discontinueds just for this
event, and a portion of the profits is donated to one or
more of our favorite nonprofits (past recipients
include Madison Symphony Orchestra
and
The Nature
Conservancy).
Everyone gets a gift bag and a chance to win one of the
door prizes. This year’s prizes included flower and
butterfly bedecked tote bags and umbrellas from
photographer Harold Feinstein’s Signature Collection. This
year’s favorite beverage was the Sparkling Springtime: a
flute of Jansz sparkling cuvee enhanced with 1 0z. of Humm
liqueur.
We’d like to thank our friends at The Soap Opera
on State
Street in Madison for their generous donation of soaps
and lotions to help us make the take-home “goodie bags”
for our GNO guests extra special, and Jill Pfeiffer at
the Overture Center
for helping
get the word out about this fun
event!
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Fill
Out Your Wish List!
We
have all heard about writing a list of things you desire to
have in your life, to help them manifest into your reality.
Hanna had this in practice here at Studio Jewelers long
before Oprah and others made the idea more mainstream. Many
of our friends come into the shop to “visit” pieces of
jewelry that resonate with them, until the day arrives when
that glowing jewel can be taken home.
We welcome you to stop in and find the objects of your
heart’s desire; those special pieces of art that you wish
to have in your
life. We’ll keep
that list on file here at the store. If you’d like, we’ll
give you the card pictured above, with the details of the
jewels that you love written on it. You can share the card
with someone who may wish to give you a gift, or you can
keep it tucked away for yourself as a reminder. (Should a
loved one stop in to see us, knowing you admire our shop,
we’ll be able to check your list and make their shopping
experience much more rewarding!)
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Hanna
Cook-Wallace Continues to Serve the
Community
Hanna
is keeping busy in the community, in addition to all her
duties here at Studio Jewelers. She is serving on
the Wisconsin Jewelers Association
board as
ex-officio Chair of the WJA 2012 five-state wholesale
jewelry show. The WJA is a nonprofit association
promoting professionalism and high ethical standards of
business practice in the jewelry trade. Their
mission is to provide educational programs and services
to improve the knowledge and skills their
members.
Hanna also is Trustee Designee of Opera for the Young, and has underwritten their
adaptation of the opera Cinderella, which will be performed in
grade schools and middle schools in Wisconsin and the
upper midwest in the fall of 2012. Opera for the Young
is a very special organization in that students are
involved at each school in their performance. The sense
of pride and accomplishment that children gain from
performing onstage with OFY’s professional artists is
immeasurable, helping create future opera and theatre
enthusiasts and performers.
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Smithsonian Curator Jeffrey Post visits Studio
Jewelers
Tom Dailing
piece to be added to Smithsonian's National
Collection
Jeffrey
Post, curator of the Smithsonian Institute gem collection,
met with artist Tom Dailing at Studio
Jewelers in June to discuss the Smithsonian's
acquisition of one of Tom's pieces for the National Gem
Collection.
~Above, Mr. Post enjoys looking through Tom Dailing's
display case of jewelry, joined by Tom and Gallery owner
Hanna Cook-Wallace.
Jeffery
Post examines his two favorite Tom Dailing
pieces, Nautilus
and
Aurora.
Nautilus won the
Saul Bell Award's Top Prize, and Aurora
took the
top honors at the AGTA's Spectrum Awards.
Both pieces
are pendants which feature a highly polished
dish-shaped reflector to accent center gemstones cut
by Master lapidary artist Richard Homer. (Post
chose Nautilus
to be added
to the Smithsonian’s collection).
Whitney
looks on as Mr. Post signs her copy of his book, "The
National Gem Collection". An online review describes
the book; "The
Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural
History holds the world's greatest collection of gems.
In this beautiful book, now available in paperback,
Dr. Jeffrey E. Post, curator of the National Gem and
Mineral Collection, discusses everything from
diamonds, rubies, and emeralds to jade and lapis
lazuli, as well as the Hope Diamond and other
world-famous stones in the museum's collection. More
than 100 stunning photographs capture the colors and
brilliance of these wonders of the mineral
kingdom."
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