Holiday bargains galore

Move over, Santa! Save your mass-produced bag of goodies for the other good boys and girls this year. The folks here in Green Valley have the chance to buy many one-of-a-kind items without traveling to the North Pole or spending a fortune.

Gifts galore will be available for purchase at the annual winter Arts and Crafts Fair sponsored by the Green Valley Lapidary and Silversmith Club starting Friday, Dec. 5, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Saturday, Dec. 6, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the West Center, 1111 Via Arcos Iris, Green Valley.

This popular fair features a wide variety of goods crafted by local Green Valley artisans. There will be fine jewelry made with hand cut stones and silversmithing techniques. Also available will be glass art, pottery, note cards, wooden bowls, fiber and fabric art, photography, and a selection of other handcrafted items. All are modestly priced and will be sold by the artisans.

Visitors will meet more than 100 artisans and have the opportunity to view unique artwork found nowhere else. They can also purchase raffle tickets for the hourly drawings and win arts and crafts donated by the participating artisans. Visitors need not be present to win and a portion of the proceeds will be given to local charities, including The Animal League, Sheriff’s Auxiliary Volunteers, and the Green Valley Food Bank, Lunch and dessert selections will also be available,

What started in the late ‘60s in Green Valley as a group of rock hounds looking for the perfect stone to turn into finished gemstones has grown into a local source for hand-crafted jewelry pieces.

The Lapidary Club has more than 300 members, some of whom display and sell their work in Tucson and Tubac. Many are award-winning artisans who have received professional acclaim throughout the country.

While enjoying the Arts and Crafts Fair at the West Center, you can also shop at La Tienda Gift Shop, the local artisan display studio located just across the courtyard from the main West Center entrance doors. The organizers admit that this is a rare treat since the studio is open to the public only three times a year.

Directions to the West Center: Take Interstate 19 to Exit 63 at Continental Road, turn west and follow the Arts & Crafts Fair signs.

There is no admission fee and parking is free. For additional information, contact Judy Jensen at 300-6642.

More about the club

The Green Valley Lapidary and Silversmith Club received a Best Exhibit Award for its collective submission to the Arizona State Fair this past summer. This is the second year the club and its members have garnered prizes. Additionally, another member won prizes at the Pima County Fair. All of these winners will be showing and selling their jewelry at the fair.

Four award-winners you won’t want to miss are:

Dick Heisel, a retiree from the aerospace industry, won two second-place ribbons in 2006 for chain making at the Pima County Fair and this year won a first-place prize for a dichroic (special glass) pendant and earring set and a second place for a dichroic bolo.

Heisel has taken the silversmith classes, chain making, a precious metal clay class and dichroic jewelry classes to improve his craft.

Sharon Schuster, who works as her husband’s law office administrator, admits that her mother-in-law Virginia Schuster was instrumental in getting her started working in silver.

“She was a member of the Green Valley Lapidary Club and worked at Desert Hills during the late ‘70s through the early ‘90s,” Schuster says. “My husband Carl and me, along with our two children, would visit Green Valley every Christmas for almost 20 years. I watched ‘Mom’ work at Desert Hills while we were here.”

In 1986, while living in Michigan, Schuster took a silversmith class, and the rest is history.

“My ideas and designs have changed since moving to the Southwest and I now work with metals other than silver,” she explains. “I like working with copper and brass and mix the metals often.”

Schuster won first place for a sterling silver ring and an honorable mention for a neck wire with copper and brass bangles.

Nancy Hanna moved to Green Valley as a year-round resident in 2006 after many years as an operating room nurse. She says she’s always had a passion for rocks, minerals, crystals, roadside cuts and Native American jewelry. She designs and makes her own jewelry and won two second places for her copper wire-wrapped pendant on a copper collar and her copper “love knot” bracelet. This is the second year she has won prizes. Over these past two years she has devoted hours of service to the Lapidary Club teaching classes, and is currently the club’s treasurer.

Duncan Creed graduated as a mining engineer from the Colorado School of Mines and was formerly employed in the mining industry in the Southwest and throughout the world. He spent several years as senior technical adviser to Kellogg, Brown and Root Engineers. Duncan joined the Lapidary and Siversmith Club in 2003 and has been the driving force in getting members to enter the Arizona State Fair. He teaches classes, as well as monitoring. This is the second year he has won prizes at the State Fair.

Duncan won several prizes in the jewelry with stones category, talking a first prize for a tiger eye bracelet, a third prize for a Mexican opal pendent, and an honorable mention for a rose quartz ring.

rford@gvnews.com | 547-9740