Johanna Methusalemsdottir has been fashioning nature-inspired jewelry since 2007, opening Kria, a shop at 801 Main St. in Margaretville in 2019.
“I was born and raised in Iceland, moved to New York in 1998 and lived in the city for 30 years, then, after exactly 30 years, moved up here, but we’ve been coming up here since 2013,” she said. “We’ve been doing jewelry since 2007; that was when I found a bunch of bones in Iceland off a bird — kria, an Arctic tern in English — and that’s the furthest-migrating bird in the world. I took it home and decided to play around with it and see what it would look like as jewelry.
“I’ve always been fascinated by shapes in nature and what they look like taken out of context,” Methusalemsdottir continued. “That is how Kria was born, the same year as our second child, Lola. I’ve moved away from bones, but kept doing jewelry.”
According to kria.world, “(Methusalemsdottir) interned for what would become a notable jewelry line emerging from 90s downtown New York, took jewelry courses at FIT, became a young mother and then a fashion stylist which led her back to jewelry and motherhood again simultaneously 13 years apart.”
Methusalemsdottir said she operates the business with husband and partner, Paul Weil. Weil, she said, is a painter and their second space, Annex, is a shared painting and art supply and exhibition space. Kria jewelry, she said, is “small batch, thoughtfully and handmade,” between the studio, home and store spaces.
Kria, Methusalemsdottir said, has evolved and endured since becoming a retail presence.
“We moved up here in 2018 and, after a year of doing wholesale and online and living in an A-frame up in the mountains, I wanted to be around people,” she said. “We saw the (space) for rent, I called my husband, and I said, ‘I think we’re opening a store.’ We opened in 2019, right before lockdown.”
Today, Methusalemsdottir said, products and patrons represent a blend of her heritage and adopted hometown.
“We have fine jewelry — sterling silver, 14-karat gold and everything is handmade,” she said. “I work only with reclaimed metal and ethically sourced stones. I’ve been told it’s delicate — we still cast a lot of things directly from nature, and I work a little bit with wax, as well. It can apply to anyone; our customers are really broad. We don’t follow trends. I think it’s more important to find something classic that a person can relate to, and jewelry is really personal and sentimental. You give it as a gift or buy it for yourself and it doesn’t go out of style, at least for us. It’s supposed to work like an heirloom.
“We sell in Amsterdam and Iceland and a few places in the U.S., then here,” she continued. “And it’s actually been really nice. People are responding really well, and I feel like, once they start, we tend to get a lot of returning customers, which is what I love. I got really emotional when I opened the store and people were actually excited; we’re in the middle of nowhere making stuff, and you don’t always know what people want. Iceland is a very different customer than we have here, but we get a lot of locals and weekenders that continue buying from us online. We make things work together, to layer, and there’s a bit of a story and it’s always a continuum. That’s really been my approach since we started in 2007, and it is just an ongoing thing.”
Methusalemsdottir said she and Weil hope to nourish and grow Kria, alongside Annex.
“My husband’s painting studio, with a friend, has the front as an art supply store, but it’s morphed into a photo gallery and we’ve had a couple of photo shows, which are getting really good reactions, so the future is to try to not lose the plot while doing both things,” she said. “We’re quite busy with wholesale, and now in our busy season here.
“Our second child is going away to college, and we just want to work hard and play hard and enjoy life,” Methusalemsdottir continued. “That’s kind of why we’re up here and we have our businesses. While we work a lot and really hard, we also are our own boss, so we have flexibility. Kria is like a glorified studio where I can make jewelry but also surround myself with beautiful things other artists like myself make. Basically, whatever is in the (store), I would have in my house.”
For more information, visit kria.world or follow @kriaworld on Instagram.
The shop is open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., Thursday through Saturday, and 11 to 3, Sunday and Monday.