April 25, 2017, by Sorrel Westbrook- "Kate Stephen grew up in rural Bethlehem, Connecticut, where she liked to pass the time “in the dirt, digging around, collecting rocks.” That habit was tempered by her father, a sheet metal mechanic, who offered Stephens “hammers and spools of wire” to play with. You can see those influences in Stephen’s eponymous handmade jewelry line. Her Westville studio is brightly lit, decorated with thrift store finds—she’s especially fond of a heavy, powder blue fan—and natural inspirations she’s collected: feathers, plants, lacy hunks of dried kelp and, of course, rocks. Across her work desk is an appealing maelstrom of crystals, semi-precious stones, hoops of wire and metalworking tools. “I work on about a million things at once,” she confirms. “My inspiration comes from the process, first and foremost. It’s an intuitive practice. I sit at the bench, and I’m inspired by the metals and the crystals.” Stephen’s designs are minimalist and striking, from a necklace that wraps a turquoise fang in fine swoops of coppery wire, to small pendants of silver etched to look like miniature birch tree trunks, to the item she’s wearing: a wedge of textured brass inspired by the sun. She describes her pieces as “earthy, yet refined. There’s a lot of duality in my work...” Click HERE to read fulla article.

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