Alumni News Fall 2007
Chow, who grew up drawing and doing craftwork, started making jewelry from glass beads her first year out of college in her downtime as a paralegal in Seattle. Seeing jewelry in store windows, “I thought, ‘I can do that!’ and went and read a slew of books and figured out how,” Chow says. Then, she sold a few pairs of earrings on consignment to stores.
She took a break from jewelry-making as a law student but gravitated back to it when she started private practice in San Francisco.
“My eyes were too tired to read after work, so I started beading again,” Chow recalls. “It felt great to stop being logical and exercise a completely different part of my brain.”
When Chow and husband Thomas Healy ’99, moved to Washington, D.C., Chow — who by now had a large inventory — began taking her part-time jewelry business more seriously.
At this point, she also developed a unique style.
“I stopped looking at other people’s jewelry and started creating my own,” she says.
Her pieces, made from sterling silver and semi-precious stones, combine colors within a soft palette and appeal especially to professional women, says Chow.
She identifies the self-assurance, people skills and composure she’s developed as an attorney as a source of her success in the jewelry business.
“Being a lawyer gives you the chutzpah to put yourself out there. I didn’t have the same confidence before I went to law school.”