So many of the shades that I have prototyped from late 2024 to present have been the result of reflections about land and sea. 

I have been thinking a great deal about home, about patria, about sense of place and the ways in which our experiences of the land we grow up on shape the people we become.

The deep love that I feel for the prairies and forests of Northern Illinois is the same love that my husband feels for the coast and the waters of the Caribbean Sea. 

I formulated the prototypes for Paradise Found in the dead of winter while daydreaming about joining my husband on an upcoming trip to Cartagena. I, unfortunately, could not join him, but the bright colors offered me a little bit of respite and escape in my nostalgic reverie as I daydreamed about the moments when I have left my fields and forests and grasses to join my husband in the sand and sea of his beloved homeland.