Theresa Killgore

Jewelry

“Math/Physics/Engineering Nerd Meets Quirky Elegant and Fun Designs.”
That’s how I describe myself and the jewelry I design. After I retired as an engineer many years ago, I decided to “play” with something I’d never done before or had the time to do. As a kid I made my parents stop at every polished rock tourist trap we passed, so I could look at the rocks. OK, I like rocks, so I’ll design jewelry. Weird jump in logic! I took a metalsmithing class at a local junior college, and I was hooked forever.

I don’t have a particular style as can be noted easily with my varied designs. I do what I see in my brain. I usually wake up most mornings with one or two new designs in my head. My brain visualizes the finished piece, then I have to backward “engineer” to step one to see how it’s put together. For me designing is quick and easy. It’s the fabrication of the work which may take a few days to a few weeks to complete. I guess my jewelry brain is linear, because I only work on one piece at a time. The design rarely changes from what I originally saw in my brain.

My work can be elegant and formal or quirky and strange, but they are all definitely different from other artisan jewelry. I’ve used semi-precious stones, as well as a piece of bark mulch, a cookie cutter, a lip-gloss container, and a bright yellow wooden duck compass from a kitchen store in a small village in the Netherlands. I don’t like to repeat designs, so everything is different. There are too many jewelry ideas floating around in my head to repeat pieces.