Creativity can only be stifled for so long. For Elizabeth Burry, it was 42 years before her own creativity took over and changed her life.
Before becoming a notable Canadian jewelry designer, Burry raised her family in St. John’s, Newfoundland and worked as a pharmaceutical representative and nurse.
“I had a big career change nearly 16 years ago when I was 42 years old,” she said. “After having lost two brothers in their 30s, and my father in just five short years, I got to a point in my life and my career where I wasn’t enjoying it anymore. I would go to the same doctors’ offices, selling the same pharmaceuticals. It was the same story to the same people, and I’d had enough. I needed to be inspired. I needed an outlet to be my creative self.”
Burry decided it was time for her to take a leap of faith and get more creative if she really wanted to enjoy her career. So in 2005, she decided to leave her well-paying pharmaceutical career to start designing jewelry full-time.
“I had a great job, I had a company car, trips. But all that means nothing when you don’t enjoy what you’re doing,” she said. “Turns out, changing careers was the best decision I ever made.”
To get started, Burry opened up her first shop in downtown St. John’s called Elizabeth Burry Fine Art & Gift Gallery in 2005, where she sold, among other things, her handmade jewelry and paintings.
“I had started making jewelry on the side a couple years before I opened the shop,” she explained. “By then I was still in the learning stages, but my brand sort of took off.”
Burry had the store in St. John’s for five years, until 2010, when her husband retired from his career and they looked at the idea of moving to their summer home in Trinity, Newfoundland.
“Trinity is a quaint, seaside village and it’s gorgeous there. We just love it,” she said.
So, Burry sold her downtown shop and packed up and moved to Trinity, where her and husband lived for six to eight months out of the year.
Straight away, Burry opened up a new store called Mirabella by Elizabeth Burry Studios to house her growing jewelry brand and sell to her wholesale customers, locals, and tourists.
“At Mirabella, I sell fine artisan craft, and I’d say half of the store is my own jewelry and paintings, and the other half is other locally-sourced and Canadian-made gifts and products,” she said. “My store features 99% Canadian-made products. Which is a big draw for tourists.”
Shortly after moving to Trinity and opening up Mirabella, Elizabeth opened up her own studio attached to the store where she crafts her jewelry, does her own photography, and runs the business.
“I love it because it’s all in one place. I work here, I have the shop here, and we are sitting right on the water. I can hear the water lapping on the bottom of my shop, there’s just nothing like it,” she said.
Burry said she predominately works with semi-precious stones and sterling silver to create her jewelry. She said her favourite stone to work with is labradorite – as there’s no two pieces alike.
“Working with labradorite you really see how deep its beauty is,” she said. “No two pieces are the same. If you look at a ruby or sapphire, rubies are red and sapphires are blue. But labradorites have all these beautiful flashes of colour within them and make them so different.”
Today, Burry said her jewelry brand and store are still successful, and she and her husband live in Trinity full-time. She is currently working on a line called “Celebration” that will be released when the effects of COVID-19 are just a memory.
“When this is all over, I think we will all need some fun and colour in our lives,” she said. “And we attribute celebration with things that are colourful like confetti and balloons, so I wanted to showcase that with this new line. I’m hoping I can launch this new collection when this is all over.”
You can shop Burry’s beautiful pieces on both her websites, www.elizabethburry.com and www.mirabellashoponline.com.