ABOUT WillieTanAtelier
Hi, my name is Willie.
The artist behind WillieTanAtelier. I live and work in Chengdu, China.
Before making jewelry, I worked in film and television. Images and stories were part of my everyday work. In 2013, I began learning metalwork and traditional enamel, and became interested in another way of telling a story: giving it a physical form that someone could hold, wear, and make their own.
Much of my work begins with the body and the memories it carries. My mother’s injured hand made me aware, early on, that our bodies can change, and that we live with those changes. In my Limb series, I return to memories of her hand through molding and casting. Working with its form gives me a way to spend time with a memory that has followed me since childhood.
HEALING THROUGH JEWELR
In 2019, a medical misdiagnosis brought questions about illness, fear, and time very close to home. Over the following five years, making jewelry became a way for me to work through those feelings and slowly find my footing again. Working with materials gave me something to return to: a movement, a texture, a form taking shape.
Those experiences still shape my work. So do smaller, everyday observations: ripples on water, the changing moon, the way silver catches the light when you move. Sometimes a piece begins with a memory. Sometimes it begins with a curve I want to follow.
The Nida Sun–Moon collection draws on the traditional Tibetan symbol of the sun and moon. I bring these forms into contemporary jewelry as a reminder of passing days and continuing cycles. In the ring, overlapping silver forms leave an opening. I think of that small space as a place for the wearer to enter the work, connecting the form to a living body.
In our studio, we work with silver and traditional enamel. Each piece is handcrafted to order. There is time spent shaping, hammering, adjusting, and finishing, and small traces of that process remain. A curve may differ slightly from one piece to another. The surface may carry a tool mark. These details keep something of the making close to you.
WEAR A REMINDER
I hope you’ll wear your jewelry often. Silver changes with time, and its surface gradually gathers the marks of your days. I like the thought that the marks we leave in the studio will eventually sit alongside yours.You might choose a piece because it reminds you of someone, or because you’re moving into a different part of your life.
You might simply like how it looks and feels on you. There is room for all of that. Whatever brought a piece into being here, what it comes to mean to you is yours.
“Wear a reminder.”
For me, it can be as simple as touching a jewelry during a busy day and taking a moment to notice where you are. A small return to your body, to the present, to something that matters.
Thank you for being here.
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Willie Tan