Stylephile: Ayesha Studio & Gallery's Designs are Handmade and Heartfelt

Ayesha Mayadas. Portrait by Laura Baer

There is an inherent romance in the delicately bold jewelry designs of Ayesha Mayadas. Each piece in her collection of outside-the-box engagement and wedding rings, undulating necklaces, and gem-punctuated bracelets is a mini sculpture rendered in gold, platinum or sterling silver.

“The first time I struck metal, I was instantly addicted,” says Mayadas, who opened her shop/studio in 2007. Starting out, Mayadas, a native of Calcutta, India, who has a master’s of fine art degree from Rochester Institute of Technology, focused on larger-scale sculptures before turning her hammer to jewelry.

With an aesthetic that is both free-flowing and wholly intentional, Mayadas’s designs often take unexpected shape and form. “The line is the artist’s signature,” she says. “It has character that articulates emotion.” Inspiration is drawn from the “ever-shifting landscape of nature,” Mayadas adds, noting that she never looks at the work of other jewelry artists. “I don’t want to be influenced,” she declares. Instead, leaves, seeds, driftwood and water inform her work. Stones, such as diamonds, are often used to punctuate designs. “I consider the diamond neutral…and use it to accentuate shapes and lines…. It acts as a period at the end of a sentence to pull energy and light to a particular place.”

Ayesha Studio & Gallery: 21 N Dean Street, Englewood; 201-503-0073.

WED TO FORM: Layers are a recurring theme in Ayesha Mayadas’s work, including the 18k Swirl necklace, accented by a diamond clasp; $12,200. “Multiple layers rest on each other or relate to each other, they fit into each other; they almost talk to each other,” says the artist.