Dazzle with Creative Magick Jewelry Local Artisan Clare Nemeth

Dazzle with Creative Magick Jewelry

 Local Artisan Clare Nemeth

Gwen Akers

The Ashland Beacon

After a 27-year teaching career at Argillite Elementary School in Greenup County, Kentucky, Clare Nemeth wanted to expand into something new, finding her passion in jewelry designing. While teaching one day, Nemeth was invited to share her jewelry at a shop one of her friends was running in Portsmouth, Ohio. From that day forward, Nemeth knew that after retirement she wanted to create full time.

“I just decided I really liked designing jewelry and while I was teaching, I thought, ‘well, this might be a good idea to kind of make it grow as I'm teaching, and then when I retire, I can do it full time!” explained Nemeth.

Inspired by one of her friends who worked with materials from the 1928 jewelry collection. After looking at these designs and the materials, she knew that she wanted to create pieces that were simplistic, yet powerful. From here, Nemeth began experimenting with earthy colors and nature-inspired designs. As a local of Flatwoods, Nemeth is no stranger to the natural beauty of this region, and this easily bled into her creative practice. Now, Nemeth’s designs focus on the intersection of timeless, antique, bohemian and nature-inspired jewelry.

Nemeth crafts each piece at her table personally, working on them until her vision is executed. “With my design[s], it's not usually something scientific. It's more like I will pull beads and things and just have them in front of me on my worktable, and I get inspired by looking at them. Then, sometimes, I'll just wake up with an idea in my head, and it doesn't go away until I make it,” explained Nemeth. “Sometimes, like I said, I wake up and I have this idea in my head, and I just go downstairs and I get started. I know where my beads are and what they do, and I know what I like to design with, so it's very easy for me to just go down and start pulling things out and working with it.”

For Nemeth the most exciting part of the process is matching pieces with their wearers. Through her shows across the area, she has been able to meet and work with so many different people, often getting to play a role in their stories with her jewelry. At the last show she was working on, not one but two different ladies approached Nemeth looking for pieces for weddings. The first lady needed something blue for her friend to wear to get married later that day. She ended up walking away with a dainty hummingbird with a sapphire blue eye. The second came in looking for a set to wear to her wedding and left with a matching bracelet and earring set.

“The biggest jolt is when someone picks up a piece and just says, ‘I love this, I want this.’ I’ve had customers buy a piece and wear it away from my table saying, ‘I don’t need a bag, I’m gonna put it on now, and that really just makes me happy,” detailed Nemeth. “I like the kind of jewelry that makes people happy.”

Nemeth plans to continue her creative practice, exhibiting at local shows and specifically at the Ashland Town Center each month through October. Nemeth will next be at the Town Center on July 10 as well as plans to exhibit her work at the new Roots and Relics Store to open in Flatwoods, Ky. For more information about Nemeth, and to check out her online Etsy shop, you can find her on Facebook under “Creative Magick Designs” or at her website at creativemagicdesigns.com.