I am genuinely obsessed with the stones — their history, and the act of making.

Jewelry has always mattered to me — it's how you carry a place, or a person, with you. That connection runs deepest in Lebanon, my ancestral homeland: Phoenician, Roman, Byzantine, Ottoman, one civilization layered over another among its ancient ruins. Standing among what was left of them — the columns, the carved stone — I found myself thinking less about the ruins than the hands that had built them. Craftsmanship. The art of making objects.

I still wear my treasured topaz and diamond necklace, found in Beirut. My daughter wore it on her wedding day. It's not just Lebanon we're carrying when we wear it, but each other. That's why I make jewelry — so each piece can hold something of someone's own, the way this one holds my ancestors, a wedding, and my daughter.

I choose every stone for its beauty, such as Peruvian opal, labradorite, turquoise, and black diamonds. The color, the way each one catches the light — that's what stops me. Gold draws me the same way, and so does Murano glass, worked by hand in Venice for centuries.

My first job was as a book designer at Little, Brown, where I learned from the old masters: hot metal, letterpress, type you set with your hands. I learned to proportion a title page, to choose the cloth for a cover, to make a book beautiful inside and out. Elegant, considered objects were the pursuit then, and they still are — the joy, always, in the making itself.

Walking ancient paths, the craftsmanship — it's what inspires everything I make. Now, instead of setting type, I hammer silver and gold — an ancient art — and every piece of jewelry I make is hammered by hand in my studio in Acton, Massachusetts.