Ashley Akers is a jewelry artist who lives in Fort Worth, Texas with her husband Frank and their crazy dog Lucy. She works in her small home studio creating her jewelry that she calls “Modern Organic”. Ashley grew up in a family of crafts people, with a fiber artist mother and a woodworking father. Her maternal grandparents were also both crafty, always making things and tending garden. This family, with a make it yourself attitude, and home filled with handmade objects and furnishings, proved very influential in Ashley’s decision to go into the arts. She attended the University of North Texas, studying Jewelry and Metalsmithing under Harlan Butt and received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1999.

Ashley’s work is influenced by her upbringing, her surroundings, the natural world and the raw materials that she uses in her work. She prefers clean, modern lines for her metalwork and uses it as a framework for whatever materials she decides to incorporate into a design. Her primary goal with her work is to utilize color, texture and contrast in a way that is interesting and unexpected in a piece of jewelry. Ashley continues to explore new materials and techniques in order to expand her jewelry-making palette. She utilizes semi-precious gemstones, and combines them with non-precious materials like fiber, polymer clay, and pebbles. She also plans to include wood in her work soon, both in homage to her father, and as a new design inspiration. Ashley works mainly with Sterling Silver, with some copper and gold accents. All of her work is hand constructed, starting out with sheet metal and wires.

Ashley has a bit of creative ADD, and finds it hard to only make jewelry. She loves to sew, cook and bake, work in the garden, and crochet (she still wants to learn to knit). When she is not doing any of these things or making jewelry you can find her with Frank and Lucy, either off exploring or simply relaxing.