Leaving behind a job in architecture for a career in jewelry design

It’s opening day at Ghibli Art Gallery, in Quito-Ecuador, and Ana is all dressed up and ready to go. She’s been working for months on her 2016 jewelry collection. She greets her guests with a big smile and answers questions about her creations. She’s an entrepreneur who had a crazy dream and worked hard to make it true.

Ana graduated Tulane University in 2010. She majored in architectural design and started working at a studio in Quito. It was a stable job, with a good starting salary. However, things didn’t feel right. “Ever since I started working at the construction firm I found myself very limited in my creativity. I would go every morning to work and sit in front of a computer drawing stairs and dimensioning plans. When I imagined myself ten years from that moment, I couldn’t picture myself doing that for the rest of my life.

“When I was younger I would make beaded necklaces and threaded bracelets for my mother because I always liked working with my hands and creating things, but I never considered jewelry making and designing as a career. I fell in love with it when I started jewelry school in Florence. My idea was to take a break from architecture, but when I started studying in depth and realizing the possibilities, I was able to find a voice and express my ideas through my designs. I found my niche in art jewelry where I was able to tell a story and put a piece of myself in each creation. It all started to have a meaning to me.”

Ana lived in Italy for two years. She told me that during college she dedicated way too much time to her classes and grades, trying to figure out her life by the book. In Europe, she decided to do things differently. She went out a lot to explore Florence’s culture, lifestyle and art scene. Instead of using all her learning from books, she used her life and experiences as inspiration for what she wanted to do.

Right after she came back, she decided to become an entrepreneur and become a full-time jewelry designer. Even though she was nervous about it, she had her parents’ support to go after this big dream. “What I always remember is a phrase that my father told me a long time ago ‘it’s better to be the head of a mouse than the tail of an elephant’ (más vale cabeza de ratón que cola de elefante). When the road gets rough I always think about that and keep working hard to achieve my own goals.”

People keep arriving at the gallery; it’s almost hard to move around. Camera flashes and champagne glasses. For this showcase, Ana designed some furniture as well, a new field for her.

“The idea was to choose a couple of pieces of jewelry and use them as a concept to create furniture. I love this kind of opportunities because I find that when you push yourself into the unknown, you obtain the most amazing and unexpected results.”

At the moment, Ana has a small jewelry workshop just outside of Quito. In the near future, she would like to have her own design store and expand her business to other countries. With all the highs and lows, she loves being an entrepreneur and making things happen. She hopes to inspire more girls to go after their big dreams and work hard to make them true. “We all want to be immediately successful with what we do but it is very difficult to start alone and from zero, and it is easy to think you have failed. The key is not to give up at any point even when nothing seems to be going your way.”