This Canberra jewellery artist is transforming how we wear fabric
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With a permanent studio in M16 Artspace, Nicola Knackstredt’s aptitude for her craft has transformed a passionate side hobby into a flourishing career.
Now running a successful online business, Nicola first discovered her talent through a short jewellery course in Sydney, describing the moment when she cut through mental for the first time as ‘transformative’.
Facing its unnerving beauty as a glistening shower of metal shavings fell she was instantly hooked, and her work as a human rights lawyer was momentarily put on hold to relive that fleeting moment of euphoria.
Since refining her craft at the Australian National University (where she studied gold and silversmithing), each silhouette of Nicola’s work represents something boundlessly powerful and utterly personal.
From bold earrings to intricately woven necklaces, what quickly shines through her designs is the deliberate way in which the metal’s innate rigidness is transformed into the complete opposite.
Drawing upon the inspiration of fabric, each design is also a nod toward Nicola’s childhood love for fashion.
“When I was really little, I wanted to be a fashion designer,” she says. “I made clothes for all my dolls—I grew up in the country, so we didn’t have much to do. That was a really great opportunity to explore my creativity,”
“But then I started looking at patterns, and to be honest I just hated them. I hated following instructions, and it felt too restrictive because its so loose that it’s hard to get that structure or that shape to it. I guess that was some of the reason that I started using fine silver,”
But it was when she discovered the TV show Next In Fashion that her work was reimagined—a baptism by fashion—that inspired artistic creations in the name of love, experimentation and pure unadulterated joy.
“I watched this programme on Netflix. It kind of reinvigorated me with all those kinds of feelings that I had when I was younger, making stuff for the sake of it and playing.”
“Watching these people who were career fashion designers and had forgotten what it was like to just make for the sake of it, I kind of thought, ‘Oh, why don’t I just try and use metal like that,” says Nicola.
Nicola’s craft has seen her construct a myriad of beautifully bound pieces that revels in curiosities and contradiction, but what continues to remain at its core is her own intimate relationship with her work.
“I always make it for myself and my body, how it makes me feel and how I look wearing it. It’s always an expression of myself. There are definitely things that I make that I think push the boundaries of what I would normally wear,” she says.
“If I’m putting something into an exhibition, it would be something you wouldn’t be wearing walking down the street, because the type of stuff is a bit more experimental. But it would still be something that I’m thinking, ‘Yeah, I could definitely wear this. I feel happy wearing it’.”
As she takes a moment to pause and reflect on the trajectory of her jewellery career (which she balances with her work as a policy and advocacy advisor at NGO), Nicola is confident the emblematic use of fabric will continue to vehemently weave itself into her future work.
Her signature aesthetic holds onto spontaneity, fluidity and freedom—a nostalgic nod to her early creations where her little dolls felt the first touches of her burning creativity.
And much like her work, her future plans are filled with duality.
“I don’t have a plan. And I think that makes me quite nervous because I don’t know where it will lead me. But on the other hand, that’s exciting about it, because it can go anywhere.”
“I don’t think I’m quite done with the use of metal as fabric. I think there are other things I can explore with it, and I just really liked that aesthetic. There may be a point where I decide I want to move on and start trying something else, but I’m not sure I can see myself stopping anytime soon.”
THE ESSENTIALS
Who: Nicola Knackstredt
Where: M16 Artspace
Web + Insta: nicolaknackstredtjewellery.com
@nicolaknackstredtjewellery
