Anya started her smithing journey on a 6-month solo trip to India where she stumbled across the opportunity to learn from a teacher for two weeks in a small mountain town. Over the last 10 years, she has felt the continuous tug of the craft in her heart, leading to extensive exploration of new skills, techniques and designs that evolve as much as she does with each passing year. Anya honors the organic unfolding of a greater mystery, giving space for spontaneity and discovery. Her careful selection of stones often evoke threads of connectivity, awe and humility that bring an alive, tangible quality to the pieces she creates. Each piece is created in an off-grid straw bale studio that Anya built herself on the 640 acres in SW Colorado that she calls home. Through Anya's intimate relationship with the natural world, she loves to use organic shapes and textures in her work. She often reclaims silver from discarded silverware or old jewelry that she melts down and then rolls into new sheets and wires to re-create from. The stones she selects to work with are ones that tend to resemble landscapes, colors or shapes found in the natural world. Many of the Dendritic Agate stones even look like they have little flowers or ferns inside them! She often creates without an exact end design in mind and patiently allows each piece to unfold as she goes.