Madeline Ellis’s mother held pins between her lips and steadied her fingers to weave a needle and thread. As young Madeline watched, her mother sewed dresses stitch by stitch until what was once a piece of fabric became a beautiful creation worn down the aisle on a wedding day.
“The idea of making things that didn’t exist before became normal to me,” Ellis said.
Ellis and her husband spent seven years studying landscape architecture at LSU. At the time, she was positive this was her dream job. However, the projects at work stopped satisfying her and making jewelry became her peaceful escape. Soon Ellis realized her passion was in bringing art to life, inspired by her mother’s work.
When she found a career in something different from what she studied in school, people told her she wasted her time.
“I saw it as a miracle,” Ellis said. “We both graduated in landscape architecture; there was no reason we should have ever been able to cast jewelry.”
As she was growing up, Ellis sewed her clothes and bags for fun, and in college, she continued the hobby with a tackle box full of beads that her grandmother gave her. Even after college, Ellis created jewelry at night. Her husband pushedfor her to create a legal business
“When my jewelry started taking off, he quit his job as a landscape architect and started helping me full time,” Ellis said.
Ellis and her husband are now the owners and creators of Mimosa Handcrafted Jewelry.
Ellis said her landscape architecture degree wasn’t all for nothing.
“I feel like Landscape gave me a deeper appreciation for a lot of different kinds of things,” Ellis said.
For example, many of Ellis’s jewelry is inspired by culturally significant things, which she learned about in landscape, she said. In her landscape studies, she dug deeply into the backstory of natural features around Louisiana. She still does this to get inspired for her next jewelry piece.
“I go down a rabbit hole learning more about the concept I’m interested in,” Ellis said. “I’m always inspired and amazed by the little details I find out about.”
Ellis said she tries to make art that tells a different story about something than what the average person is used to hearing about.
Ellis’s favorite piece is the Pelican cuff because, for her, it tells a story about personal accomplishment. From fashioning the clay, molding the design, to learning how to to use casting equipment, this piece was the most difficult to make, Ellis said.
“My husband watched every YouTube video trying to figure out how to make this thing happen,” Ellis said.
However, the story Ellis wanted this cuff to tell to the world was about state pride and the beauty of Louisiana.
“The pelican is an amazing bird,” Ellis said. “Most people don’t know that it would cut its own stomach to feed its young if it had to.”
Ellis tries to focus on parts of the story that people don’t usually know or think about.
“I love the face people make when they realize something for the first time,” she said.
However, Ellis’s most rewarding thing is being a catalyst for other people to connect, she said. For example, if someone compliments you on your bracelet, it can open up a conversation. However, she tries not to make her pieces very obvious about what they are about so that the wearers can decide if they want to have that conversation.
“In a lot of ways, jewelry can be an ice breaker,” Ellis said. “When two people connect over the jewelry they are wearing, I have done my job.”
Wakely Carter works at Wanderlust Abby, a Baton Rouge boutique that sells Mimosa Handcrafted Jewelry. Carter said when customers walk in, they are immediately drawn to the Mimosa section of the store.
“Normally, not everybody likes the same thing,” Carter said. “But I watch so many different people come in and find something they like on that jewelry wall.”
Ellis’s advice to aspiring jewelry designers is to never limit yourself to one specific career.
“When I quit my landscape architecture job, I faced so much fear and anxiety of the unknown,” Ellis said.
However, everything she has learned this far has been a piece of life’s puzzle that she needed to find:
“The creativity I learned from my mom has been the biggest piece so far.”
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