Youell prefers silver because it gives her greater freedom in choosing stones; for this Winged Figure, she used pevel agate and Chinese writing stone.

For Sylvia Youell, working with silver is about having fun with both the creating and the creations — pieces that open, twist, or move.

Living in a small cottage in the woods speaks of peace and tranquility, quiet times of contemplation, and fruitful days of creativity influenced by the beauty of life. All the better if you're a silversmith finding great appeal in the shapes and forms of nature. Such a life abounds with endless inspiration.

Meet Sylvia Youell, award-winning silversmith of Sister Bay, metalsmith instructor at the Peninsula Art School in Fish Creek, and cottage dweller in artistic Door County, northern Wisconsin.

Another Winged Figure, made from pevel agate and Chinese writing stone.

Youell was introduced to the allure of silver while an art major at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. As part of her curriculum, she studied various artistic media; it took only one semester in metalsmithing for her to be hooked for life. “As soon as I did that, I knew that was all I wanted to do,” she says.

Even though she graduated as a physical education teacher, Youell's interest in making jewelry has always been her mainstay. Her teaching career enabled her to return to University every summer to take as many hours of metalsmithing as were available for graduate study. In the demanding world of high school teaching, her art was a savior — and that teaching also allowed her to save an important part of herself for her art. “I appreciated that I could save my creative energies for my fine craft with metal, and not burn out as many art teachers do,” Youell recalls.

What started as a creative interest led to a small summer and fall gallery and finally, after her retirement from teaching in 1992, to a full-time year-round jewelry business in Door County. The silver world has become more and more aware of Youell's superb creative abilities, acknowledging her craft by awarding her no less than 15 awards for excellence of fabricating and creative interpretation.

A brooch of abstract design, with Madagascar jasper. Photo: Liz Kuhns.

THREE STRANDS. “There are three motivations of which I am aware that lead me to create artwork in metal,” Youell says. “First is the joy of manipulating the metal, of working directly with the silver or gold, of forging the metal into new shapes.

“Second is the realization that the objects themselves are more fun if they can be handled, opened, twisted, or looked into.

“Third is the inspiration for designs found in the organic flowing lines and forms of nature. The satisfaction of creating, of solving problems, and of shaping the metals, is as important as the delight in seeing the finished product.”

These three strands are evident in her work. Take her current teaching of metalsmithing as an example. Having taken a class with Youell recently, I can appreciate her fine understanding of the medium and the tools used to work it. Time and again when I presented her with sketches of my ideas, I was told to first consider the engineering of the project. “Have you thought about how you are going to do this?” I was asked.

Of course I hadn't. My presumption was that, no matter what I designed, it must be possible to make and that was what the class was going to teach me; my first lesson in being practical and logical. Of course, some of those designs have since ended up buried in a file as they proved to be far too ambitious (a label I thought sounded better than “impractical”).

From the Triangle series, a brooch of textured and formed silver set with azurite-malachite. Photo: Liz Kuhns.

Youell is a stickler for understanding silver, the required tools, and the fundamentals of working with both. Meticulous attention should be given to craftsmanship at all times. To her these are very important aspects of silversmithing and she strives to pass on that importance to her students. She feels that once these concepts are mastered, one can do almost anything.

Youell puts heavy stress on being comfortable with one's tools: understanding the limitations, potential, and risks involved in handling metalsmithing equipment. Not only is it important to understand how to work with tools, but also how to take care of them. After all, no matter how great a craftsman's potential, he can only be as good as the condition of his tools allows him to be. Showing respect for one's tools and working environment by working cleanly and efficiently will also foster a better comfort level.

Also, Youell says, it's important to understand the medium. Fortunately, silver is a very forgiving metal to work with. You can work on a large scale, it looks pretty, and is very malleable. Silver weighs about half as much as gold or platinum, which means much larger pieces can be worn without discomfort. It is the softest of the three precious metals, with the lowest melting point, but these are also advantages; should a piece bend out of shape, it can easily be bent back again. “If it is right, it is right. If not, just straighten it out and start again.” Gold, on the other hand, Youell finds very restrictive, mostly due to its cost. With gold, most metalsmiths must continually consider costs, resulting in final pieces being small in comparison to what can be achieved with silver, which comes at a much more affordable price.

“I want to have metal that I can work with, experiment with, have fun with and not be concerned about mistakes,” Youell says, pointing to buckets full of silver off-cuts in various shapes, sizes, and stages of experimental work. “That is something you will never see in a goldsmith's studio. They just cannot afford to have that amount of unused gold lying around.

“Another fact about gold is that most [mainstream] pieces are created by means of lost wax casting, unlike with silver, where the fun and excitement is in the actual hand-fabrication of a piece, personally being responsible for the design growing into something of beauty.”

A further issue Youell has with gold is that it is seems to come with an expectation that stones set in gold, especially high-karat gold, must be faceted gems, higher-cost stones. Landscape jasper, for instance, would rarely be seen set in 24-karat gold; in the eyes of the mainstream industry (as opposed to galleries), the stone would devalue the gold and the gold would overprice the stone. Silversmiths, Youell feels, have a greater selection of stones to choose from, since they are not limited by cost considerations, opening up wonderfully creative and colorful designs at affordable prices.

Youell used a scalloped bezel and curled silver wire to complement the malachite in her Winged Figure. Photo: Sylvia Youell.

STONE-TALKING.

Youell thoroughly enjoys stone-talking and takes great pride in displaying her vast collection of beautiful opaque stones, each one selected with great discernment for its color, surface texture, mineral markings, and lapped shapes. Her affinity with the gem world is evident in the way she touches, holds, and talks about her gems, a trait any gemologist will appreciate.

Known for her love of gemstones and their use in her unique pieces, it stands to reason that it's the stone that determines the design in Youell's studio. “I find a really neat stone, one that can be used as the body of a piece. The outline of the stone is traced onto paper and the design flows from that. It's all in the eye — what your eye is for: design. This determines the success of a piece, the feel-and-see of how well it works.”

An example is the malachite figure from her winged series. The bluish-green stone is a mixture of malachite droplets on an azurite background, giving the stone a bubbling appearance. This effervescence was continued in the wire work of the wings and the scalloped bezel around the stone, each technique and effect complementing that of the other. The overall effect? A pin that looks light and lively and ready to fly.

Not only is Youell known for her wonderful wearable art, she has also won numerous awards for her practical, playful, or humorous objects or containers, some of which can be twisted and opened to find lovely surprises inside.

The UW-Milwaukee Alumni Art Show award winner called Fair Lady Comb and Compact is just such a piece. A beautiful palm-size container designed for a lady's grooming, this oval box has breasts in relief on the front and a derriere on the back, executed using chasing and repousse techniques. Inside the container, a mirror is found attached to the inside bottom, on top of which lies a silver comb with a sculpted rosewood hand grip and set with a pearl. These are unexpected finds that make one smile with appreciation. Delicate, feminine, and certainly a collector's piece.

Youell loves pieces that open and move; shown here is Spin-It, an Amazing Toy, made of silver, sardonyx, copal, mink, enamel, pearl, and tiger’s-eye. Photo: Sylvia Youell.

In contrast to the delicate and feminine is the Spin-It, An Amazing Toy, another award winner, this time from the Wisconsin Designer Craftsmen Exhibition. Made from silver and copal, this three-inch piece is silversmith engineering at its best. The tip of the handle is accented with sardonyx to complement the color of the copal and it came as no surprise that when tried out, the spin of the top was true. Again, opening it up revealed a surprise of another sort. Two games, one on either side of the round center disc and designed purely to amuse, were there for the playing. On one side is the enameled Spin-It game complete with its set of numbers and compass-like needle. On the flip side is the game called Amazing Maze, with the silver labyrinth spelling out the word “amazing” and with two beads, one of tiger's-eye and one of pearl, rolling around the maze, all enclosed with a glass dome. Both inside ends of the top are lined with luxurious mink fur, obtained from an old hat found in a trunk. All in all, an excellent example of meticulous craftsmanship.

The full interior views of Spin-It, an Amazing Toy Photo: Sylvia Youell.

Certainly, Youell is an accomplished artist who turns her craft into a fine art appreciated by many who are proud to claim they own a Youell piece. Just shows what being a stickler for silversmithing fundamentals can do for one's career.

Youell shows you how to make one of her pieces in “Wings of Silver” - and how to choose tools in "Basic Pliers."