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Mother & Daughter Bring Love & Laughter To Their Creativity
Love, luck, hard work, positive attitudes, and true artistic talent have combined to create success for Vanessa and Kate Stevens’ Salvage Designs in Billings, where they create beautiful and useful art from discarded objects. [Photo by Kim Ibes]
By Kim Ibes “At first it was for our own creative interests,” says Vanessa Stevens in a voice so playfully laced with an infectious undertone of merriment and mirth, it can’t help but lighten one’s step while meandering through her overflowing, and vibrantly colored shop, appropriately named, Salvage Designs. Suitably situated in one of Billings’ many industrial districts, it resides in the front half of Stevens Brothers Mechanical (Plumbing, Heating, and Piping Professionals), next to Armstrong’s Pest Control and across the street from Fisher Construction. “This was all office space at one time,” Vanessa says referring to their building. “We cut a hole in the wall.” “Several,” adds her daughter and business partner, Kate, with more than a hint of mischievousness to her voice. Mother and daughter share the same joyful demeanor and often finish one another’s thoughts. As they look around, they point out multiple walls that have been ingeniously finished in creative-industrial-chic (for example, painted pallets stacked floor to ceiling in a rainbow of colors). “We kind of went wild,” adds Vanessa with a chuckle. “But there again, it’s reusing and repurposing.” And recreating, which is the basic theme of Salvage Designs. Here, the discarded, the worn, and the unwanted find not only a new home, but also a new imaginative purpose and inspired new form. Voila! A spurned bike rim becomes a sparkly new chandelier; scrapped toolboxes are blinged up for new precious cargo like jewelry or fine silver; and neglected upholstered chairs find new life with Annie Sloan chalk paint and rivets. “It wasn’t something I’d ever thought I’d do,” says Vanessa. “It’s real therapy, cheap therapy,” she adds with a lilting chortle. Vanessa, Kate, and two friends used to meet at a shared art studio to collaborate on art projects and in general have a wonderfully inventive couple of hours to tell stories and enjoy one another’s company while working on their individual creative vintage projects. “We all had different interests at the time,” recalls Kate. “I was doing faux cabinetry, Jane was a metal worker, Chris was just creative, and mom was doing concrete counter overlays.” (Continued on page 42)