Cape Cod Visionary Helps Grieving Women
By Luke Schmaltz, VOICES Newsletter Editor
“How much good inside a day? Depends how good you live 'em. How much love inside a friend? Depends how much you give 'em.” – Shel Silverstein
Writer, performer, and artist Christine Ernst has a visceral approach to creativity.
With an arsenal of tools, a discerning vocabulary, and a keen eye for aesthetic appeal, she hammers, stamps, and adorns antique silverware – blending the endurance of precious metal with the power of the imprinted word.
In her Cape Cod-based Spoon & Hammer Studio, she fills custom orders from clients who wish to commemorate a loved one, an event, or a cherished ideal with carefully chosen inscriptions. These messages are then stamped into silver spoons and other implements to create one-of-a-kind bracelets, rings, earrings, pendants, and other keepsakes.
Ernst is quick to mention her studio’s aptly assigned theme. “The motto is, ‘Hammered in rage. Stamped in love,’” she laughs. “I started making jewelry because I love taking something ugly and mundane and turning it into something beautiful. I’m all about words, so hammering words into a piece of metal is the ultimate sort of poetry.”
On a Mission to Heal
When she was 34, Ernst was diagnosed with cancer which put her aspirations to be a writer into overdrive. “My whole life, I wanted to be a writer and when I got diagnosed my first thought was, ‘Holy shit’ and my second thought was, ‘well, now I have something worth writing about.’ I was waiting for the important story to come about.” Thankfully, Ernst has since recovered and has been cancer-free for 20 years.
Recently, Ernst and longtime friend Kerry Bickford of SADOD hosted two special workshops entitled “Silver Linings” for bereaved mothers. Their guests were invited to experience the “hammering silver” process as they created wearable reminders of their loved ones who died of substance-use-related causes — many within a short time of one another.
Bickford was inspired to explore the cathartic possibilities of such an event, because Ernst once made her a custom-hammered silver bracelet inscribed with the name “Nathan” in honor of Bickford’s son, who died after a long battle with substance use disorder.
“I love the studio’s motto because I identified with the rage,” Bickford explains. “When you lose somebody, there’s a lot of rage. The prevailing sense is sadness, but there’s so much rage against the drugs and their power over love.” Once Bickford announced that she and Ernst were hosting the “Silver Linings” workshops, enrollment was immediate across Bickford’s network of bereaved parents and grandparents. “We’ve had two workshops thus far, and we are planning another one on April 22,” she says.
Kindred Spirits
Bickford describes the unique circumstances that make “Silver Linings” workshops special. “While you’re hammering, sanding and working with the silver, you’re gathered around a table in a small workspace and the conversation gets very intimate because these are all women who identify with each other,” she says. “Some who had never met each other before became instant friends. By the end of the first workshop, they had made plans to go to Christine’s show. They formed this amazing bond while they were working and remembering their loved ones. They laughed, they cried, and they hugged.”
Ernst seconds this, explaining how an expectedly solemn occasion was anything but. “I’ve been making jewelry since 2006,” she begins, “But this was the first time I had invited anyone into my studio to use my tools. I imagined it would be somber and contemplative, but they were rather raucous and funny. They asked tons of questions, looked at the millions of spoons I have, explored the various possibilities, and they were able to choose the piece that would best serve them.”
A Personal Process
“As we started to hammer the messages,” Ernst continues, “I was able to see how these women were processing together. One mother would say to another, well, you’re going to wear it a lot so make sure you choose carefully. Or another would say that she wasn’t going to wear it, she just wanted the name stamped onto the metal so she could have it on her nightstand. The whole process was so thoughtful and deliberate. When you’re grieving you don’t have a lot of choice in how you can express your feelings, and this allows you to deliberately decide how you want something to appear and what it will say to the world or to yourself.”
“The fact that they were involved in the actual participation of making their pieces was critical. The laughter and the camaraderie reminded me of my writing gym. The way women in particular relate to one another and can automatically support each other. No topic was forbidden, and this was the best work they could do together. They laughed with each other and joked with each other, and there were tears, but the fact that this is a sort of physical activity made important conversations a little easier. Kerry’s idea to have this in a ‘maker’ workshop was pretty neat.”
Multiple Pathways
Like her jewelry making, Ernst applies a therapeutic mindset to her penmanship. She cites how themes explored in her writing gym workshops are parallel to those explored in her jewelry studio. “Hammering words into old spoons is an unexpected but natural path for the work I do as a writer already,” she says. “I always try to solve what’s freaking me out or making me sad by putting it on a page. We all suffer because we are terrified to share our story. The best part of the writing gym is when a woman who has lived in silence comes in, and she isn’t sure if it’s going to work for her. Then, to see her begin to share her stories and at the same time hear her stories in other women’s stories is really powerful medicine.”
“I started making jewelry simply because I like to collect old spoons,” Ernst continues, “And I realized I had enough for about 100 people in my home. So, I culled out the beautiful spoons, forks, and knives and I thought about what I could do with them. I began hammering them and flattening them and then I began stamping important words onto them. The first word I stamped for myself was “courage,” which I needed at the time. It was more important than writing it on a sticky note or on a mirror because it was more durable.”
“Stamping something into metal is hard to describe,” Ernst continues. “It’s cathartic because it is hard to do, and you realize what you’re stamping is probably going to outlast your lifetime. Whether it ends up in the hands of your heirs or in a thrift shop – it almost doesn’t matter.”
Ernst’s work with Bickford has inspired her to keep inviting people to her studio. “Come and hammer, it’s so therapeutic,” she says. “Taking a piece of metal and turning it into something else – it’s magic and it feels so good. Also, what you hammer is enduring in a way that writing on a page, singing a song, or baking a cake may not be. So much of our lives is ephemeral, not long-lasting. But when you’re hammering something into metal it's like ‘wow – this is going to last beyond my lifetime.’”
Mothers and grandmothers interested in participating in a Silver Linings workshop can email Kerry Bickford at: [email protected]. Special thanks to sponsors The Sun Will Rise Foundation and Cape Cod Neighborhood Support Coalition.