Happy Shack Designs
Vendor
Multi-medium artist working in handmade bookbinding, photography, jewelry, and mixed media journaling
Kelly Warren
Hi! I'm Kelly, the force behind Happy Shack Designs. I'm a life-long Florida native living in Jacksonville, Florida, with my husband, twin daughters, two dogs and two cats. Happy Shack Designs is a dream long in the dreaming. I've wanted to create my own business doing some sort of artwork for as long as I can remember.
Before venturing into my current creative outlets, I spent countless hours working on various needlecraft and sewing projects, skills learned from my mom and my grandmother. I can credit my foray into jewelry to my girls. When they were born, I wanted a mother's bracelet, so I decided to learn how to create one myself. From there, I was hooked, Happy Shack Designs was born, and I am self-taught through trial and error. My business was officially incorporated in 2005, and my very first arts festival was the Springtime Tallahassee Arts Jubilee in March 2005. For my jewelry designs, I use only the highest quality materials, including sterling silver, Thai silver and fine silver, gold vermeil, 14K gold fill, and even 14K gold by request. Color in my work comes from handmade glass lampwork beads, Swarovski crystal and Czech glass, gemstones and pearls. I also create a "market line" with my budget friendly prices using stainless steel findings instead of sterling silver and 14K gold-filled.
I am also a photographer, mixed media artist, and handmade book binder. I've been a photo bug for as long as I can remember and love all the creative options digital photography brings. My fine art photography often contains layers of texture that add an added dimension to the works. I started experimenting with mixed media art in 2009 and am enjoying that medium as well. I often combine my photography into mixed media pieces and also into my jewelry lines by creating glass pendants from my photography. I dove into the world of art journaling and bookbinding in 2012, and I love to create handmade journals out of repurposed materials like upcycled cereal boxes and vintage children's books.
On a personal note, I love the outdoors, play the guitar badly, play the piano fairly well, sing somewhere in the middle, love to bake, spend as much time as I can volunteering my photography skills at the local animal shelter, and have the most adorable red-headed twin daughters ever seen (comin' from a proud Mama); they are the light of my life. I also work full-time in higher education in addition to my creative business, so it gets a little crazy in our world at times.
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