Madeline Ellis
Metal, Clay

Mimosa Handcrafted

My work focuses on creating pieces that bring the wearer home to beauty and belonging. My jewelry speaks to a part of each client’s personal story. It inspires them to share, to wear, and find others with similar storylines, creating connections and bonding them in a personal way. My culturally inspired work ties people to a sense of place and belonging – the place a person calls home and the people they call theirs. It gives them a way to connect by way of mutual fondness over something meaningful.

Ultimately, my work is about experience and relationship. A special MIMOSA piece becomes a favorite for many reasons. When a client holds her mimosa piece in their hand and shares their story with someone, they are the embodiment of why I do what I do. Nearly every time, a heart is opened and a connection is made. The world feels smaller and we all feel a little bit closer. I use the ancient art of Lost Wax Casting to create our pieces. Each piece begins as an idea then finds itself in 2-D in my journal. Once details of the design and scale are worked out it is transferred to a block of hard wax. I carve and whittle the wax until the only thing left is the piece of jewelry I’d imagined. From there we build a wax tree and encase it in a mold of plaster like material. Once the plaster like mold is dry and hardened the wax tree with the carved wax piece is melted out leaving a void of the future piece of jewelry. We melt the metal and pour it into the void in the paster mold. Once the metal has cooled the entire mold is dunked into water where it dissolves and leaves a solid metal version of the original wax tree. The piece of jewelry cut from the tree, tumbled for cleaning, grind and buffed until it is it is in it’s finished state ready for it’s new home.

Madeline Ellis was born in Thibodaux, Louisiana. Her focus is predominantly in jewelry making. She creates most of her pieces in bronze and silver using the Lost Wax Casting method. She also includes hand built ceramic and glass enameled work in her collections. Madeline earned her degree in Landscape Architecture from Louisiana State University. She is predominantly self taught, only studying metal smith basics briefly at Arrowmont and the occasional studio workshops. Her degree and work gave her a solid foundation for design principles and an awareness of our local Louisiana landscape, culture, architecture and human experience that one can see heavily influences the inspiration for her work. Madeline started the jewelry company MIMOSA Handcrafted in 2008, with the mission to create pieces that bring their customers home to beauty and belonging. In the last few years it has grown to a company of 10 full time employees. She shows regularly at juried festivals throughout the south. The work of her and her team at MIMOSA can be found in several retail locations as well as her online store.