Living Design Studios founder, president and studio director Jessica Adams says that the experience of working with one’s hands cannot be underestimated. It’s that passion Adams has for working with her hands in her metalwork studio that allows for the company to celebrate its 30-year anniversary this year. Living Design Studios, 1010 Carbon Court in Erie, is an architectural and ornamental metal fabrication studio that focuses on custom and complex uses of ornamental metal in residential and commercial buildings.
“Technology can give us the impression that we are all powerful,” Adams said, “When you work with your hands, you have the opposite experience.” The company’s metalsmithing work is featured in several prominent buildings on the Front Range and nearby foothills, including the Ralph L. Carr Colorado Judicial Center and the Cash Register Building in downtown Denver; the Anschutz Medical Center in Aurora; and the Boulder Public Library.
The company has received numerous industry awards. Adams said she grew up in a family that was supportive of the arts and of building construction. Her love for working with her hands and creating things with metal only grew as she got older.
“Family conversations at the dinner table were about architects, engineering and stages of how things are built,” Adams said. When Adams started to imagine her adult life, she pictured herself as a jeweler. But after a year in college, she spent the summer in Europe with her sister.