From Drawing to Metalsmithing: How Illustrationist Began

As a child, I was always drawing and making things. Coming up with an idea and then creating something with my own hands felt completely natural to me. So when the time came to choose what to study, going to art school was an obvious choice.

Art school felt like a candy shop filled with different crafts and techniques. Typesetting, woodworking, soldering, welding — I found all of it fascinating. I wanted to understand materials, experiment with techniques and, most of all, make things myself.

And then I discovered metalsmithing and jewellery making.

‘You Won’t Learn Anything Just by Watching’

I didn't start making jewellery because I had a carefully mapped-out plan to become a jewellery designer. I was simply curious about the craft.

One day, I gathered my courage and walked into a local goldsmith's workshop to ask if I could watch him work.

His answer was simple:

‘You won't learn anything just by watching.’

Before I knew it, I was spending one day a week as his apprentice.

Instead of standing on the sidelines, I was allowed to start making things myself. I designed my own jewellery and, with his instructions and guidance, learned how to turn those designs into actual pieces.

I learned how to work with metal, tools and traditional jewellery-making techniques. More importantly, I discovered the satisfaction of taking something that exists only as an idea or drawing and slowly turning it into a tangible object.

I loved it.

Jewellery making brought together many of the things I had always enjoyed about drawing and other crafts: designing, experimenting, working precisely and creating something with my own hands.

Except now, the finished piece could also be worn.

After that experience, I couldn't imagine giving it up.

From Jewellery Making to Illustration

Later, I moved to Ghent, Belgium, where I started a second art degree, this time in illustration. Throughout my studies as an illustrator, I continued making jewellery alongside my illustration work.

At first glance, illustration and metalsmithing might seem like two very different disciplines. To me, however, they have always felt closely connected.

Both begin with an idea, a shape, a line or an image. Sometimes that idea becomes an illustration. Sometimes it becomes a piece of jewellery.

Eventually, I realised I didn't have to choose between the different crafts I loved.

I could bring them together.

That idea became Illustrationist.

Illustrationist: Jewellery and Illustration Under One Name

Illustrationist is the independent jewellery and illustration studio of Katja de Vries, a jewellery maker, illustrator and designer based in Haarlem, the Netherlands.

Through Illustrationist, I can combine the different crafts, materials and techniques I have fallen in love with over the years.

I design and handcraft original jewellery in sterling silver, gold and brass, including earrings, rings, necklaces, bracelets and brooches. Alongside my handmade jewellery, I create enamel and wooden pins, cards, posters, stickers and other illustrated goods based on my original artwork.

My jewellery is made by hand in my Haarlem studio. Selected pins and printed products are professionally produced from my original designs and specifications.

Illustration and jewellery making are therefore still intertwined in my work, just as they were when I was studying them.

From a Drawing to Something You Can Wear

My work is inspired by nature, geometry and vintage photography. These influences might find their way into an illustration, but they can just as easily become the shape of a ring, a brooch or a pair of earrings.

One of the things I still love most about making jewellery is watching an idea become an object.

A design often starts small: a thought, a sketch, an interesting shape or a detail that catches my attention. From there, the making begins.

With handmade jewellery, that process remains part of the finished piece. A piece of jewellery isn't just a design. It has been sawn, soldered, shaped and finished by hand.

Perhaps that is what fascinated me so much when I first stepped into that goldsmith's workshop all those years ago.

I didn't just want to watch someone make something.

I wanted to learn how to make it myself.

Handmade Jewellery from Haarlem, the Netherlands

Today, Illustrationist is my one-woman jewellery and illustration studio in Haarlem, the Netherlands.

Every piece of jewellery starts with me. I develop the designs and make the jewellery by hand in my Haarlem studio. Every order is also personally checked, packed and shipped by me to customers in the Netherlands and abroad.

Illustrationist is for people looking for distinctive handmade jewellery, wearable art, original pins, illustrations and thoughtful gifts outside mass production — pieces designed and created by an independent maker.

Although my work has developed considerably since that first day in the goldsmith's workshop, the essence of what I do hasn't really changed since I was a child.

I draw. I make things. I explore materials and techniques. I come up with ideas and try to turn them into something real with my own hands.

Now, I just have a name for it.

Illustrationist.