Texture, color, and form all coordinate into a one-of-a-kind, unique jewelry creation by Robin Kahn.

Nowadays, we are forgetting something extremely important, and thereby experiencing more problems than we need to. This is what we are forgetting:

Every single human being is unique. Though we share attributes, we do not march in mental lockstep. Every human has different experiences, thoughts, dreams, ideas, opinions. If we accept this truth and — through civilized interaction — learn from one another, we grow, both individually and as a society. If we insist, however, that 100 out of 100 people think and act the same, we relinquish creativity and life.

Jewelry designer Robin Kahn learned this lesson over 27 years of teaching special education in Florida and Washington. Now retired, she applies it to both her day-to-day living and her art.

“My students, each one special, were ages 5-10 with a wide range of developmental challenges both academically and behaviorally,” the Spokane artist says. “What I learned from these children is that each of us is unique. As I got to know each child, I could then divine and fashion an individual approach to help that child grow and learn.

Blue metal earrings with beads by Robin Kahn, one of a kind and unique.

“I am now creating jewelry full time. I believe my creative process for designing jewelry is inspired by my students, each one different and unique. My jewelry is designed with no two pieces identical. Each has its own shine.”

Each has its own shine.

Hunting at the Hardware Store

Specializing in copper and silversmithing earrings, necklaces, and bracelets, Kahn is constantly focused on refining her skills as a metalsmith. Her first foray into jewelry making was years ago, a class on beading that, unexpectedly, unlocked the hidden artist within and a passion to get to know her. Since then, she has never stopped taking classes, from beading to coppersmithing, from yard art welding to ceramics. Each learning experience adds to her repertoire of creativity and ideas.

copper metal stamped bracelet beads robin kahn

Copper pendant necklace with stamped design and beads, by Robin Kahn.

“To say I work with a range of materials is an understatement,” Kahn says. “I love nothing better than hunting at hardware stores, garage sales, and auctions, foraging to find unusual materials that can be used in a unique and different way than was originally intended.

“Buttons, drawer pulls, coins, pottery, beads, car parts, keys, bullet casings, rocks, recycled copper — this is Nirvana for someone who likes to discover and give new life to the unusual!”

Not surprisingly, it requires a fair amount of space to not only store all the materials Kahn uses to create her craft, but to transform those raw materials into completed, wearable art.

Filling the Workshop with Unique Items

Initially, her studio space was a six-foot folding table set within the well equipped workshop of her husband, Marv, a retired math teacher who “can fix and fabricate most anything.”

Over time, she added kilns, a soldering station, a jeweler’s bench, storage for the many beads that she adores and accumulates, cabinets for gems, multiple tables for assembling completed pieces, display racks for shows, storage for specialized tools, and space for enameling, metal fabricating, and forming. If you’re wondering how this impacted Marv, well,

“Marv’s shop has migrated into a new space in our backyard.”

round copper earrings unique textured embellishment robin kahn

Round copper earrings with textured embellishments by Robin Kahn

It works. And they’ve each found their happy space.

Kahn’s latest focus involves enhancing individual pieces with texture, design, and patina. Using bits of lace, fibers from a lime bag, cactus or leaf skeletons, hammers and metal stamps, Kahn incorporates unconventional elements onto the metal surfaces of her jewelry pieces. Ideas ebb and flow during this process, she explains — often what she thought was going to emerge evolves into something very different.

“Being open to this evolving process is why I love sitting down to make jewelry.”

Traveling to Shows

Every year, Kahn takes part in the Little Spokane Artists Studio Tour at the end of September, and this year will also be at the Sun City Oro Valley, AZ, November Art Fair. She also attends the Tucson Gem and Mineral show which, with more than 4,000 vendors, is the largest, oldest, and most prestigious gem and mineral show in the world.

It’s been many years since that first jewelry class that started this journey, but for Kahn, every time she sits down to create a jewelry art piece, it’s a new, and unique experience.

“The process of fabricating a new piece starts out with a vision of color, texture and shape that inevitably evolves. Each piece finds its own direction, until ultimately, the final design is revealed.”

And the important thing about that final design is that it is unique, original, and one of a kind.

Just like each of us.

Robin Kahn is the featured Art Event at Wenaha Gallery from July 17 through August 15, 2022.

Contact the gallery, located at 219 East Main Street, Dayton, WA, by phone at 509.382.2124 or e-mail art@wenaha.com. Gallery hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. from Monday through Friday, and by appointment. Visit the Wenaha Gallery website online at www.wenaha.com.

Torch-fired Coneflower necklace by Lynn Gardner, guest artist at Wenaha Gallery

When you’re pulling together an outfit, the right accessories — earrings, scarf, necklace — make all the difference. So when jewelry creator Lynn Gardner dresses for her day job as an escrow officer and can’t find the right earrings, she goes down to her studio, puts together the perfect pair, and heads to the office.

Jewelry by Lynn Gardner

“Life is too short not to wear art,” the Sandpoint, ID artist says. Unique, customizable, and vibrant, Gardner’s torch-fired enamel pieces are, as she describes it, “where color meets metal.” Frequently collaborating with her husband, Mark, who began his art career in high school as a jeweler’s apprentice for the princely wage of $1 an hour, Gardner operates her business under the name of Lonesome Dove Designs, maintaining an Etsy shop under the same name.

It has nothing to do with Robert Duvall, Tommy Lee Jones, the book, or the movie, but everything to do with an actual bird.

“When we lived in Arizona, I used to have an aviary in my studio with two diamond doves in it,” Gardner explains. “When one died, the other called out continuously for its mate. So I named my business Lonesome Dove.”

An aviary is a fairly unusual accoutrement to a studio, but Gardner loves animals. Upon moving to the much colder climate in Idaho, she disbanded the aviary except for a 28-year-old Cockatiel that rode in the front seat with Mark during the move, singing, non-stop, the Andy Griffith theme tune. At his new home, the bird was joined, eventually, by a new menagerie — six chickens (not in the studio), two black labs, two cats, and six horses, one of whom is a Belgian draft horse named Bob, adopted in a near-starved state from owners in Arizona.

Earrings by Lynn Gardner

“Bob’s been trained to drive, but honestly his harness weighs a ton,” Gardner says. “I don’t like riding him as it takes a ladder to get on him and then it’s like straddling a sofa.

“So Bob is just basically a big yard ornament that eats a lot!”

But Bob, like the lonesome dove, has his part in Lynn and Mark’s art business. Visitors to their studio and students of the couple’s jewelry and pottery making classes enjoy the gardens and landscape on the Gardner’s 10-acre spread, after which everyone wants their photo taken with Bob.

“After a few hours of that, he hides in the back of his pen,” Gardner says.

Outside of the barn, Gardner finds inspiration for her jewelry in nature, and five acres of aspen and fir in the back of the property are a haven where she walks, meditates, picks up rocks and leaves, and plans what she will create next.

“My son has built trails winding through the forest and made benches for me to sit upon and reflect,” Gardner says. “Mark and I often find ourselves taking a bottle of wine and sitting on the bench watching the leaves.” Each is inspired differently, and the collaborative work they do reflects their individual personalities.

Necklace by Lynn Gardner

“Mark is very architectural and is inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright. I am inspired by hobbits . . . I love the quirky. When we collaborate on pieces, we have a lot of fun doing it.” Much of the jewelry is a tandem affair, with Mark creating the setting and hand-forged clasps or chains, and Lynn responsible for the enamel and color work.

Recently featured in Belle Armoire Magazine, a publication showcasing wearable and hand-crafted fashions, Gardner is represented by galleries in Montana, Idaho, Colorado, and Arizona. Active members of Art Works, a local art cooperative that taps into the tourist industry of the area, both Lynn and Mark take turns with other members in staffing the gallery’s retail store.

“The other day, when it was Mark’s turn to work, he was just ready to close up when a young couple came in, walked right to my case, and said they had to have one of my pieces as a gift for their mother who collects my work,” Gardner says. “That was a thrill!”

It is a thrill that she and Mark regularly, and gratefully, feel.

“We make each piece knowing that the right person will come along and be enamored with their purchase,” Gardner says.

“Nothing pleases us more than to be approached by someone wearing our work.”

Lynn Gardner is the featured Pacific Northwest Art Event artist from Monday, November 7 through Saturday, December 10. She will be at the gallery Friday, November 25, from 3 to 7 p.m., as part of the Christmas Kickoff Celebration. Free refreshments will be served.

Contact the gallery, located at 219 East Main Street, Dayton, WA, by phone at 509.382.2124 or e-mail art@wenaha.com. Gallery hours are 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. from Monday through Saturday, and by appointment. Visit the Wenaha Gallery website online at www.wenaha.com.

Wenaha Gallery is your destination location for Greenwich Workshop Fine Art Prints, professional customized framing, and original fine art paintings and sculpture by notable Pacific Northwest artists. Books, gifts, note cards, jigsaw puzzles, and more are also available. Visit the gallery today!

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