About a year ago I started thinking about photographing Kat Cadegan’s handmade jewelry. I was drawn to her inspiration from nature and the care and creativity she puts into each custom piece, remade family heirloom, or cast design. Knowing I’d need the right tools for the job, I purchased a macro lens to help me with the close up photos and crafted my own version of a lightbox to keep reflections to a minimum. Through my partnership with Revy Web Design, who built Kat’s website, I was able to start photographing some of her dreamy pieces a couple months later.

We started with some of Kat’s wholesale items that hadn’t made it to the website yet. The first time around we just photographed them on white to match the style from her past photographers. I’ve learned so much since that first shoot, especially how to balance tiny reflective objects in the most precarious positions.

Next up I was able to work with a model to capture how some of these and other items look while being worn. We’ve since come to learn that because Kat’s collection is so vast, it’s next to impossible to capture every piece on a model. Instead I now photograph them on a styled set. We’ve also developed a scale system to make sure that items on white relate to one another properly.

Since last summer, I’ve been constantly stopping in at the store to pick up new pieces and photograph them before they are listed on the website or sent off to their new homes. Kat and her team work non-stop and there are always new and unique items for me to drool over. I now photograph most items on white and also in a styled setting to show more of the character of the piece. This has become my favourite part of photographing Kat’s jewelry. I love linking shapes, colours, and textures within each piece to their likeness in nature. It didn’t take long for Kat and I to develop a cohesive style that flows so well together on her Instagram. Here are some of my favourites from the past few months.

If you want to see more of by mine and Kat’s work, head over to the website - her gemstone collection is my favourite! Note that not all of the images are photographed by me.