My interest in jewelry and gemstones began at an early age. My father received a degree in geology while in college and had gathered an extensive mineral collection. Captivated by the beauty of the crystals, I would spend hours gazing intently at them. It was not long at all before I began to develop my own collection. In fairly short order, it seemed as though someone had opened a quarry in my bedroom.

When I turned 18, I decided to get the equipment to cut and polish many of the stones in my collection. After cutting a few practice pieces, I took them over to Korner Gem, the local jewelry store/rockshop. Impressed by the work I had done, the owner offered me a job as an apprentice. It was there that I was taught the basics of jewelry repair and began an obsession with jewelry design. Still unsure of my vocational direction, I began working on a vocal performance degree at Hope College in Holland, Michigan. During the summers, I would return to my hometown of Traverse City and spend my time working at Korner Gem. In 2000, having spent two of my summers working there, I decided to take a break from college and move out to San Francisco to attend the Revere Academy of Jewelry Arts. It was there that I learned the techniques I would need to know to become a successful goldsmith; everything from stone-setting and engraving to advanced fabrication. It was also where I took a class taught by an artist named Kent Raible, one of the nation’s most renowned goldsmiths and designers. He specialized in (and taught) a technique called granulation.

Upon learning this new technique, I traveled back home to Traverse City, Michigan and began to practice it every chance I had. Nonetheless, I still had not yet graduated from college. Eager to finish a degree and realizing that I did not wish to continue to deal with the stress of performing, I returned to school and began working towards a bachelor’s in German. It had been my original intent to move to Germany to study at the famous jewelry school in Pforzheim, which I had learned of while in San Francisco, and a German major would prove quite handy. However, in my first semester back at college I met the woman who would eventually become my wife, Sara. With the realization that I would not be able to leave her to study jewelry in Germany, I began driving the two and a half hour drive back to my home nearly every weekend to work on jewelry. During that time, it was not uncommon for me to arrive at home at 8:00pm and work until 3 o’clock in the morning on my latest piece. In 2002, I finally graduated from Hope College with a major in German and began designing jewelry full time. Later that fall, I ended up moving down to Holland, Michigan from Traverse City to be closer to my fiancée while she was in Law School. Upon her graduation, we were married in March of 2005 and currently reside in Holland, Michigan.