Barbie is a Baltimore-based jeweler with a BFA in Jewelry and Metalworking from the University of Georgia.  Her work combines precious metals, stones, and pearls to create a clean, contemporary look. She currently operates her own studio in Baltimore and manufactures two distinct lines of jewelry available in galleries and craft stores throughout the country. 

The BARB WIRE line is all handmade with sterling silver or gold-filled wire and glass tubing.  Barbie’s interest in architectural lines, geometric shapes, and balance has been a strong influence in her work.  These earrings are designed to be a lightweight, colorful, and fun addition to your jewelry collection.   To maintain, very gently rub the exposed wire with a polishing cloth.  Please hook the earrings wire closed while on the ear to prevent loss.

Carmen Richardson Rutlen is the award winning author of Dancing Naked…
in fuzzy red slippers. Carmen currently lives in northern California,
and has lived all over the world, including Germany, Okinawa and
Venezuela. Through this extensive international exposure Carmen can
count to ten in all three of those languages. Carmen describes
herself as a “hot blooded Spaniard” and although her mother’s parents
did hail from Spain, her father was Danish and as such, she is more
precisely a “Spandinavian.”

Carmen majored in Psychology and minored in English and attended too
many junior colleges to mention. She did not graduate, however, as
her dating life consistently took precedence over her homework.
Through sheer determination and strength of will she found a way to
continue her studies in psychology as an independent researcher by
just watching people, like her friends and people at the mall, on a
case by case basis. She has not written a formal treatise on her
informal research and consequently, is not accredited in this field in
any way.

Carmen was awarded “The Celebrity Award” from the National League of
American Pen Women for her newspaper column, “The Prune Picker.”
While she was proud of this award, she was hoping for a nice trophy,
but was instead got a red felt cut-out of an owl as her prize. Sadly,
one day her dogs got to it.

Carmen’s first book, Dancing Naked…in fuzzy red slippers, has been
translated into Korean and has won two national book awards, including
the prestigious Benjamin Franklin Book Award as well as the BAIPA
award for “Book of the Year” in Humor and Inspiration. Carmen’s
mother put it most succinctly when she said, “Oh Honey, your book is
so good.” Carmen is currently working on her second book.

At 64, Carmen is smack dab in the middle of middle age. (Assuming
she’s going to live to 128.) She thinks its time to have some fun.

The Love Letters line features monogrammed ceramic pieces, perfect for commemorating life’s events, big and small.  The entire line is hand carved and customizable with either monograms or single letters.  The pieces are ideal for bridesmaid’s gifts, hostess gifts, or any occasion where you want to give something personal.

Below is one example of a vase with our "NLG" with a small Magnolia vase

The Magnolia line features gift and serving pieces adorned by hand crafted ceramic magnolias.  The art of crafting these magnolias has been perfected over 50 years and the art has been handed down for generations.  These pieces are perfect as wedding gifts, housewarming gifts, or to add a little beauty to your Sunday dinner.

 We displayed the Foxberry Lane Pottery next to our "Resident Flower Photographer" Joe Barr!

He created Stacking Ring sets and Stacking Mother’s Rings, which are stacking rings with a custom combination of gemstones. The separate rings stack together to form a single unit; most styles can be rearranged to vary the look. 

Don has participated in and has won many awards at regional and international exhibits.  He’s served as a juror for several art exhibitions, and has been a visiting artist at colleges and universities. He has vast experience in repairing jewelry and custom designed jewelry.  

Don Pekarek is a lifelong resident Algonquin, IL of the Chicago area.

The following pictures are only a sample of what we have in the Gallery.

"Degas"

"Cezanne"

"Echo"

"Starry Night"

"Van Gogh"

These are rings you need to see in person.  So stop in soon!

Pottery:

Hand crafted pottery by Louisiana artist Ken Follette.  Made in America!

This handcrafted pottery is made in Georgia by mother and son team. The Magnolia line features both gift and serving pieces with an option to have it monogrammed.  Made in America!

Handmade terracotta pottery from Fired Up Clay Works in Oregon.  Made in America!

Pottery from Mexico. Lead free, microwave safe.

Jewelry:

Frank Lloyd Wright Jewelry Collection in silver and enamel.  Made in Rhode Island and authorized by the FLW Foundation.

"Cylindricals Collection" made of sterling silver, acrylic, and aluminum.  Designed and made by Florida designer Martha Peterson.  Made in America!

Designers John and Linda Whitney of Sarasota, Florida create their works in various metals: brass, copper, bronze, fine silver, and sterling silver.  Made in America!

Sterling Silver and colored glass by Marland designer Barbie Levy.  Made in America!

Other:

Blown glass ring holders designed for that special ring you always wear but take off only briefly.  Made in America!

Dancing Naked…is a fun, inspirational gift for women buy for their girlfriends, sisters, mothers, and of course themselves :)

Check in soon to see what else is new!

-NLG

Employee Georgia is in charge of Instagram and takes the pictures with her Iphone and alters the images in an app called AfterGlow first, and then shares the images through Instagram and then to Facebook.  A friend of hers started the Project Life and instead of having a personal Project Life 365, Georgia decided to make one for NLG! In fact, the NLG bio on Instagram says "If Northern Lights Gallery was a person and used a smartphone, these are the pictures it would take."  So really, it is "personal" for us!

 We started the Project Life 365 on Jan 12th so we started 12 days late.  Here's the Daily Challanges from that week:

SUN – JAN 6th: #STILL_LIFE
MON – JAN 7th: #SIMPLICITY
TUES – JAN 8th: #FRONT_DOOR
WED – JAN 9th: #IN_A_DRAWER
THURS – JAN 10th: #GAME
FRI – JAN 11th: #SIGNATURE
SAT – JAN 12th: #MINI

For Mini, our image was of the miniature figurines from Romero Britto.

 The challanges for the week after that were:

SUN – JAN 13th: #FORGOTTEN
MON – JAN 14th: #TEMPTATION
TUES – JAN 15th: #CONFUSING
WED – JAN 16th: #SIGN_OF_WINTER
THURS – JAN 17th: #THIS_IS_SO_ME
FRI – JAN 18th: #NEWS
SAT – JAN 19th: #STYLE

We wrote the following for each image:

Day 13: advice that shouldn't be #forgotten #projectlife365

Day 14: NLG has so many #temptations (and we love it!) #projectlife365

Day 15: It's #confusing how an artist could create such a complex piece of artwork (acrylic on clay by Terry Habeger) #projectlife365

Day 16: #sign_of_winter in Racine! Brought to you by photographer Jason Madson! #projectlife365

Day 17: #this_is_so_me. Don Nedobeck said it perfectly! #projectlife365

Day 18: Have you heard the #news? NLG is connected with social media! Find us on Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest. Twitter is coming soon! #projectlife365

Day 19: Our Baggallini #style #projectlife365

***I'll post the next weeks images when we finish the weekly challanges!

What does that mean for us at NLG?  We need to keep up!

Facebook was the first social media outlet that we joined.  We created a Northern Lights Gallery Facebook page about 2 years ago.  We have a love/hate relationship with Facebook because when we finally got the hang of it, Facebook switched to "Timeline" and we had to learn it all over again!  It's been frustrating at times but we do understand how important of an outlet this is for businesses. We love it when our customers "like" an image; sometimes we even get "likes" from people all over the world! It's amazing how fast viral information travels.

So while we were still learning Facebook, this new little website called "Pinterest" became popular.  And what is Pinterest????

"Pinterest is a virtual pinboard. Pinterest allows you to organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. You can browse boards created by other people to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests.

People use boards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and share their favorite recipes." (Quote from Pinterest.com)

At first, we didn't know how we would use Pinterest for the gallery. We don't carry wedding dresses or have recipes of our own!  BUT, about a week ago, something clicked! We looked at Pinterest again, and realized we could put a "pin it" button on our browser toolbar and pin our images from our website! Perfect!!!  We are now putting final touches on our Pinterest boards and we love it!  We even searched some of our artists that we were pinning and saw other Pinterest users "pinned" images from our website months ago!

Another popular social media outlet is Instagram.  Instragram is a photo sharing app that allows users to change filters on the image (color to black and white) and easily share to Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr.  Just like Facebook and Pinterest, Instragram has a community where you can follow friends and celebrities and see all of their pictures too!  Unfortunately, you do need a smart phone to post  pictures but we do share our NLG pictures on Facebook to share with our customers.

And being a small business that uses all these social media outlets means that we WILL follow, like, and pin back :)

P.S. we might get Twitter soon! (We just have to figure it out!!!)

Cards by Rifle Paper Co. --Sold at Northern Lights Gallery!

Thank you to all our customers near and far!

Wishing you a 2013 filled with health and happiness :)