Welcome to Echo Silver Studio (ESS)! My name is Patricia Tsosie, I make all of the jewelry you see on this website. My background in jewelry started shortly after being discharged from the Army in 2004. I was released with a handful of new disabilities that I didn't have going in. At the age of 19 I suffered a TBI while training resulting in an impacted C7 burst fracture that by all intent and purposes should have left me paralyzed. At that young age, I didn't understand the severity of surviving the injuries I had.
Life was really confusing as I had planned on being in the military as a career. It was by chance that I was gifted a beading set and somehow sold the very first piece I made to my sisters boss for his wife. He paid me $60 for a triple strand beaded necklace. I couldn't believe it. It was made clear early on that I would need to work somehow and unfortunately I stopped beading to find a job. The cognitive restrictions that come with a brain injury are tricky to navigate and as an invisible disability, I seemed unreliable and inefficient at the positions I found myself in and often felt pressured to disclose my disabilities which never made a difference as I was fired from every job I held after the military. In 2017 I was finally awarded by the VA my Total and Permanent Disability status which allowed me to start focusing on healing myself 13 years after the fact.
In 2019 I was told by a physician about a local art school that offers free classes to veterans. After doing some research, I enrolled into the pottery class that started mid March of 2020. That class was cancelled due to covid and classes weren't reopened for another 2 years. By that time I had a baby that we didn't know we could have and I realized quickly that if I didn't reach for something artistic that I may get lost in the expectations of motherhood. End of 2022 I signed up for a lapidary class and realized after the 8 weeks were up that I needed something more challenging. When jewelry classes became available in 2023, I jumped at the opportunity not knowing what to expect. After the initial shock of learning new tools and techniques, something clicked. I feel like I felt a physical shift in my brain when the concepts of silversmithing really took hold. It's something that's been so fulfilling to learn and has been rewiring my brain in ways I never knew possible. I've noticed changes in my cognitive functions, memory retention and focus that I understood to be impossible from what my doctors suggest.
Spring of 2024, I missed signing up for the new semester and nearly went into a spiral. At that point, these jewelry classes have been monumental to my mental health and to have 3 months where I wouldn't be in class nearly ruined me. I decided at that point that I needed to set something up at home that would allow me to continue creating, I knew if I didn't keep myself exposed to the art, that I would inevitably start to forget what to do. I posted up crystals for sale, made $600 and took that to a local jewelry shop and bought my first setup. The first week of August 2024, I made my first piece of jewelry at home. I had been sharing this journey on Tiktok and have posted every single day since then, sharing this journey with the friends I've made along the way!