About Me:

I had always been into 'making and doing' creative things - I remember the sheer delight of being given crayons, glue and paper by my parents when I was small! Later, I progressed to embroidery, the lure of all those threads and colours was irresistible; the complexity of following a chart and then later designing my own work gave me many happy hours.

At school I enjoyed creative pursuits, but was happy to be chanelled into academic avenues; at the back of my mind was the thought I might follow something creative but the focus of school seemed to be to produce workers rather than business-owners though I did some story-writing and was forever hopefully sending off my manuscripts to patient publishers; after leaving college I went to work firstly as a secretary, then as a personal assistant, and having attended university later on, as a Personnel Officer - I enjoyed the latter very much, and it came as a shock to be diagnosed with Endometriosis which meant it would be difficult to hold down a 'real' job; a period of time followed where I scratched my head a little and wondered where life would take me.

Around that time, I made my own tiara for my wedding, and this created a little flurry of people asking me to make tiaras for theirs; I also got into making stationery as well as wedding garters; I attended a silversmithing course at my local college and then began making small items of jewellery; over time I felt making jewellery was more enjoyable than working on anything else, and so 'SLC Designs' was born; most of what I do here is self-taught; the lure of beads and colours is wonderful!

I was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis a few years ago - this confirmed my decision to work for myself which is my 'silver lining' - allowing me to enjoy the passion of creativity in my own time and space, and this makes me very very happy.

Nowadays I also have 'Beadaddict' which focuses on the supply of beads and jewellery making supplies; but making jewellery, for me, is the most enjoyable process off all, waiting for inspiration to strike and pieces to 'make themselves' - other elements of my silver lining are my cats Cleo and Aston, and my horse Merlin - my children; the difficulties that life throws at us are sometimes hard to comprehend, but there are often wonderful compensations in the long term.

The site and my jewellery making are a work in progress; I don't look at it as a job, but as something I choose to do. I believe strongly that creativity is within everyone - what happens in life shapes your present and your future, and creating, to me, is in my soul.

Kind Regards

Stephanie Lewis-Cooper

Above: with the love of my life.....

All Content, Design, Text and Photographs Copyright Stephanie Lewis-Cooper, SLC Designs, 2002-2008