Stephanie Ritchie

Stephanie Ritchie lives with her husband and two children in Gulf Breeze, Florida. She was born in Kentucky, raised in the South, and studied at four colleges from the Appalachians to the Pacific Ocean. Having done all that moving she is very surprised and glad to have landed in the life she is living today.

How I Got Started in Jewelry

I picked up my first pair of jeweler's pliers between my freshman and sophomore years of college, when I took a job at a costume jewelry store run by a cranky old lady who tried very hard not to teach me how to make any jewelry. Somehow I managed to learn to do some basic repairs, string beads, and knot pearls. My folks then bought me a green tackle box in which to carry my half dozen hand tools and growing bead collection back to college. My first "jewelry show" was in 1987 in the lobby of my dorm, where I hung earrings all around the top edges of the lamp shades. I made almost a thousand dollars that night. I was hooked. Eventually I took a basic metalsmithing class. Then another. And another. I say of myself that I am semi-self taught because my skills have not come from formal jewelry training nor apprenticeship, rather from workshops, one-on-one tutorials, and years of willingness to destroy a little metal in pursuit of technique.

My Work Today: From Texture to Torture

I have a long running affair with the surface of metal. My work is heavily textured with techniques such as reticulation, chasing, and raising, done mostly with handmade tools. Over these 23 years people have asked me for heart jewelry. I have scoffed, telling them if they want heart jewelry they should go to the mall. One day a friend asked me for a heart necklace and I snapped. I said, "I'm not going to make you any silly, saccharine heart jewelry because if I made a heart it would be broken, tattered, torn, beaten up, full of holes, patched, and maybe set on fire!" That's when it hit me: I could make a heart like that. The Tortured Heart line was born. Let's face it, if you've lived, loved, or lost very much at all your heart probably has some marks to show for it.