Our Materials

Tagua (Vegetable Ivory) — check out our tagua products

Tagua is one of our favorite materials. Also known as “vegetable ivory,” tagua was used around the world for buttons until plastics replaced it. The “ivory” is hardened coconut milk. The coconuts themselves are relatively small, grow in bunches like grapes, and can be eaten by monkeys before they dry out. The palm is native to the Ecuadorian and Peruvian Amazon, but is now a part of sustainable community development programs in the coastal province of Manabi, Ecuador.

Silver — check out our sterling silver products

Our silver is sterling. We buy pure silver, which comes in little clumps, and melt it down with other metals to get the percentage to 92.5. (We can’t use pure silver because it’s too soft.) After we mix it with other metals, we heat it up again and turn it into sheets, bars or thin wire ourselves. We never use electrical machines to do this; the whole process is powered by our own hands and arms.
You may notice that none of it is certified ecological. That’s because, although silver is mined in the Andes, “ecological” silver is not available to Andean artisans! One of the goals of our page is to create demand for green materials in their countries of origin.

Coconut and Seeds — check out our coconut and seed products

What we refer to as “coconut” on the site is coconut shell, not dried coconut milk, which is tagua. Oftentimes, we re-use the shells of coconuts that we eat! It is a strong material and its natural curve makes it more interesting. It is also the pan-Latin American carving material, from Mexico to Argentina.  We also use tiny coconuts that we collect ourselves here in the mountains, for necklaces and for pipes.

We collect plenty of seeds from the Amazon at an indigenous friend’s organic farm/reforestation project near the city of Tena in the Napo province.  They’re a great renewable material and are stronger and more water-resistant than you might expect!  We collect seeds in many shapes, sizes, colors and patterns.

String: Fio Encerado — check out our macramé products

All of the string we use, unless otherwise noted, is “Fio Encerado,” a Brazilian string originally developed for leatherwork. It’s wonderfully strong — never breaks — and its colors last for years no matter how much sun and water you subject it to. It is definitely the macrame material of choice in South America.

Alpaca — check out our metal pipes

On many other websites, alpaca is called “Peruvian silver” or “a low grade silver.” In fact, alpaca is not silver at all! Alpaca is a zinc and copper alloy, sometimes with a little iron and nickel as well. We use alpaca in non-jewelry items such as pipes and occasionally in earwires.

Stones — check out our semi-precious stone products

We use a wide variety of semi-precious stones from all over South America. “Jade” (which you can see in two of the pictures below) is a stone from the northern Ecuadorian mountains, just south of the border with Colombia. It is a rather soft stone and lends itself quite well to carving, so we often use small jade masks and carved animals. It is much darker than conventional Chinese Jade and is chemically very different. Most of the other stones we use come from southern Peru. They are mined and worked near the city of Ica. All of our amber comes from central Colombia, and we have a few stones from Brazil as well. We always either buy our stones in markets in La Paz, Bolivia, or in their country of origin.

Leather — check out our recycled leather products

All of the leather we use on this site is scrap leather, little pieces that were left over from big projects that we use for bracelets. We never buy leather or economically support the leather industry in any other way; no cows were harmed in the making of our jewelry!

Bullhorn — check out our bullhorn products

Another byproduct: the bullhorn we use comes from cattle ranches in Argentina. For years it was wasted, but thanks to the green movement and a few creative souls it is now popping up in artisan jewelry.

Wood — check out our wood products

These days, it’s hard to find trustworthy wood products, with different certification systems and confusing labels. Our fine wood comes from two sources: scraps from a friendly carpenter’s shop in Manabi, Ecuador, and from tree branches from a friend’s farm in the Colombian Choco. Our friend who cuts the branches planted the trees himself, and very carefully makes sure that the trees are not harmed.

We also use lots of recycled (”agglomerated”) wooden beads from Ibagué, Colombia.