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By day Kerri O’Connell works for an advertising firm. By night she works for her own company, Good Wood, crafting two, three and four-finger wooden rings for anyone fly enough to wear ‘em.

Chief Magazine: So how did all this begin, were you just interested in the idea, was it all you? 

Kerri O'Connell: Well I’ve always painted, and I’ve always done design work, and sculpted, I had the idea out of nowhere basically, I saw a ring, and I thought a name would look good on it, like old school graffiti type style, like back in the eighties, and I decided to try it out, see if I could do it.

What kinds of woods do you use? Was it your decision to use wood, or would you like to use metal later? 

I use Basswoods, I thought about using metals and marbles, but wood is just like easier to cut through, and I usually get thorough it pretty fast. I’ve used woods for a while, but I’d like to try some other materials.

So where do you usually create all your projects, and how long does it take for you to complete them? Do you have a lot of time; do you have your own shop?

I’m looking into get my own shop right now, but now I'm working out of my apartment, bugging the hell out of my room mates with all the sawdust, and everything that goes on. But depending on the ring, if it’s a custom-made ring, it’ll take me anywhere from an hour two hours…some of the rings that I made took me only about fifteen minutes. 

Fifteen minutes?

I can get through them pretty quick, after doing them for a long time, more and more orders I get.


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So what was your first ring? 

The first ring that I made is the one I’m wearing right now, its uh, a star and a jungle pattern on it, its just something I wanted for myself, and I’ve been wearing it to this day.

Do you do colors? 

Right now I’ll do colors with stains.

So you just made it one day, started wearing it out and were people just saying, you know, ‘Holy Shit! I want that!’ or how did it all get going with being more than just for yourself? 

Basically I just started giving rings out to all my friends, and they started going to parties, I started going out to parties, wearing the rings, more and more people started to notice them. I used to work at a skate shop, and people started wearing them there and just uh, kind of took off from there, word of mouth pretty much.

Where did you come up working at skate shops and going to parties… 

I grew up in New York City, I’m from Queens, I live in Brooklyn now, and pretty much since I was young I was hanging out downtown and in Williamsburg, and exploring the art scene and all the pretentious people. 

In total how many years have you been up on this?

In total, I’ve been doing this for only about a year and a half 

When you go out, do people know you as that girl who makes those fly rings?

Its starting to get that way, which I don’t mind because it’s something I do, and something I love and they’re not saying ‘yo that’s the porn star’, so I’m an artist, and I’m glad that people are noticing me for my artwork.

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