Abstract artist Shannon Lewis organizes her paintings around the idea of space. “I’m interested in liminality, the spaces between things,”

Look closely at Mel Stiles’ jewelry and you’ll see the traces of the architect she once was. “A lot of my designs are more contemporary, more modern and use bold color combinations,” she says. “I’m very interested in composition and form and the function of the material, which I think comes from working as an architect.”
Stiles, a Pennsylvania native, received a degree in architecture from Pennsylvania State University in 1996 and moved to Phoenix, Ariz., where she discovered jewelry-making. “I took my first class in silversmithing in 1998 and started making jewelry at home,” she says. 

Eighteen-year-old high school senior Sam Ryan took a ceramics class as a freshman at Grant High School in Portland that served as the catalyst for her wanting to become an artist.

When Tom Cantwell bought a sewing machine, he had no idea that it would lead to turning leftover and vintage fabrics into one-of-a-kind curtains.

Most people sand the paint off salvaged wood. Artisan woodworker Michael Olfert, on the other hand, makes sure the paint stays on.

When mixed-media sculptor Stephen Adams moved from San Francisco to Oregon six years ago,it changed his art.