Today we’d like to introduce you to Angela Zancanaro.
Angela, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
When I was little I was always creating, building or drawing something. I knew I wanted to be an artist I just always thought I would be a painter. I went to the Academy of Art University in San Francisco to study fine arts painting and drawing. Half way through the program I started to realize how much of the time in class was being spent as studio time. I believed that in school you should be learning new skills and techniques and after you graduate you can then perfect the skills you like. Frustrated with the painting program I took a semester to take a few electives from other majors, one being a beginning jewelry class. I instantly fell in love with metal and the many ways you can manipulate it. After that semester I switched my major to graduate with bachelors in Jewelry & Metal Arts and haven’t looked back since.
Has it been a smooth road?
I think starting a small business there is always going to be struggles. After spending 5 years in San Francisco I wanted to move someplace warm and friendly. I moved to Todos Santos, Mexico. It has been one of the most rewarding and also most frustrating experiences. Simple things like ordering supplies has become a task of finding the next person coming to visit to bring them to you since the mail system here is unreliable. I don’t even have a street address.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Angela Zancanaro Metalsmith story. Tell us more about the business.
Currently I am almost exclusively using silver for my designs, mainly because I love the process of reticulation. This process includes continually heating up the sterling silver to raise the fine silver to the surface to create a natural and unique texture. I think using this as a main technique sets me apart because in all honesty it is inefficient, a bit uncontrollable and sometimes the results are not aesthetically pleasing. I find it to be very therapeutic to just focus on not melting the piece.
How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
I think the biggest shift will be starting to use gold witch I hope to start using in the next year or two. I would also like to do more art and statement pieces. I don’t want to grow so big that I don’t have a hand in the end products since this is what I fell in love with so much in the first place.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.angelazancanaro.com/
- Phone: 15412181781
- Email: angelakayart@gmail.com
- Instagram: az_metalsmith
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Angelakayart/
Image Credit:
Photos by Jennica Lowell & Angela Zancanaro
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