What is Navona Handmade?

We're three friends from art school who decided to pursue our artistic passions as an artist collective. We meet regularly to discuss, critique, and encourage each other.  Christine is our jeweler, Bethany is our potter, and Julia is our fiber artist.

Finding Artistic Inspiration

We're an artist collective. We take a short trip together twice a year to someplace new and inspiring, and create a collection of jewelry and home decor based on our experience. Yes, we built a business around taking vacations together, and we think we’re pretty clever. From these trips, we gather inspiration for the color palette, patterns and textures that guide each collection. After we come home, we take a few weeks to process, brainstorm and sketch. Then, we meet up and decide how we’re going create a cohesive collection that still represents each individual artist’s memory of our trip.

Visiting Pittsburgh

We traveled across the stated, from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh, to search for inspiration for our latest collection. We visited Falling Water first. It's a place I've known about for decades, but never gotten the chance to visit.

Another highlight of the trip included Randyland, a little creative haven in the North Side of Pittsburgh, created by Randy Gilson and his partner. We were lucky enough to hear an impromptu speech by Randy about homelessness, medical issues, and other obstacles he's overcome in life. He spoke a lot about bringing joy and happiness into the world, and how Randyland is his attempt to bring people together.