Creative collection Woven Husk’s Stacy Madden salvages what nature discards to create beautiful must-haves for the home
VISUAL ARTIST STACY MADDEN SALVAGES WHAT NATURE DISCARDS TO CREATE BEAUTIFUL PIECES FOR THE HOME
STACY MADDEN NEVER imagined palm trees would play such a pivotal role in her life. Her home on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast, enveloped by towering lontar, adonidia and banana palms, has become her “palm farm”. “I have gorgeous friends who’ve become my little tribe of palm stalkers too,” she says. “I’ll often come home and find a pile of husks, which have been thrown over my fence.”
The importance of palms becomes clear when you learn that Stacy uses their constituent parts in her work. She deconstructs their fronds, husks and seed pods, and sculpts them into textural wall hangings interspersed with clay beads and materials collected from her local beach, which is just a stone’s throw from her home. “There’s poetry to be made from what nature discards,” says the artist, whose business Woven Husk was founded last year. A true creative at heart having completed a fine arts degree majoring in sculpture, Stacy always intended to pursue visual arts, yet her creative journey took a detour when she ended up working in the corporate sector for more than a decade. “I always made excuses for not pursuing art; I was either too busy, or I didn’t have a designated studio space,” she says.
Motherhood, though, changed her perspective, and while on maternity leave with her second child, Harper, she reflected on what made her happy. “Being creative is when I come alive, and following your passion is an example I wanted to set for my kids, so I looked for an outlet,” she says. Enrolling in a photography course she honed her skills behind the camera and returned to her love of sculpture. “I had lots of white walls in my home to fill and wanted some props to practise photography, so I began making wall hangings.”
Encouraged by friends who saw her work and requested pieces for their own home, Stacy began posting photos of her pieces on Instagram. Commissions began streaming in, and they haven’t stopped. “I’m genuinely blown away by it all,” she says. Among the many ‘pinch-herself moments’ have been commissions from the Coqui Coqui hotel in Bora Bora, and orders from as far afield as Canada, Germany and the Netherlands.
With that backdrop of palm trees providing a ready source of materials to use in her open-air studio, the desire to create is ever-present, yet Stacy is most productive when son Zig, five, and daughter Harper, two, are at school and childcare. “Between school drop-off and pick-up I’m head down,” she says. “But I really don’t see it as work. I enjoy every aspect of it.”
No one could be prouder of the career path Stacy has carved than her husband Stuart, who’s her biggest champion. “He puts up with all the mess I leave around and the late nights I put in because he sees how much I love it,” she says.
“It’s taken me a long time to get here, but I feel I’ve finally found what I’m meant to be doing.”
“I LOVE THAT THE MATERIALS I USE ARE SPECIFIC TO WHERE I LIVE, A SUBTROPICAL COASTAL AREA” ~ Stacy