Ziran Muse: Carina Hardy
I officially met Carina last year when we were living in Bali, though we had followed each other online for a few years. The first time we hung out we joined her at a warung (local Balinese restaurant) in Ubud for lunch. I just instantly was smitten by her: genuinely warm, beautiful, could speak fluent Balinese, real and open! I felt a kinship towards her, and knew we would become friends. It can be weird and disappointing to meet people IRL after knowing them online. It's cheesy to say I was excited to get to know her, but I don't care! The world needs some happy endings!
After lunch that first day we went to Carina's studio, which she runs with her partner and lover Tavish. I must note, I was smitten with Tavish too. He's very tall, very charming, and very smart. They are an unstoppable pair.
Carina and Tavish are the duo behind Carina Hardy, a thoughtful, sculptural, and beautiful line of fine and demi-fine jewelry that's handcrafted in Bali. My favorite piece is the Crouching Venus earrings, featuring a perfectly round female form crouched inside a teardrop gold cavity. It's the ultimate mix of soft and hard, wearable and refined.
In this story we talk about many things in Carina's life... from growing up in Bali to the evolution of the brand to our relationship with our bodies. We went long on this one because I really wanted to dive into Carina's world... a place that brims with curiosity, magic, sensuality, and unequivocal pride in women and our stories.
Background!
Carina: I’m Carina. I was raised between Bali and New York City, in a family of kinda kooky creatives.
Tavish: I’m Tavish. I’m from Brooklyn - fast forward - fell in love with Carina and now I’m here in Bali.
How would you describe growing up in Bali in three words?
Carina: Oh, that's good. Chaotic, creative, sacred.
What has Bali taught you?
Carina: Bali continues to teach me to be in the moment, to actually be present.
Tavish: I think that it teaches you to think past some fundamental assumptions that you have from growing up in America, about human nature. Maybe our operating system, our hardware, is not actually our hardware. It's our software. What we think is biological or innate is actually cultural conditioning.
It’s a sort of stark cultural relativism in terms of values, in terms of how people relate to and engage with time, priorities, ethics, sense of self, all the things that make us who we are. There's a clear story that the west teaches you. And living here and opening yourself up to kind of experiencing the culturally illegible allows this crystallization of a new set of values, beliefs, ways of being, to form.
Very well said. I've been thinking about how people say, “the foreigners in Bali are expats.” But I’ve read that this idea of “expats” is exclusive to Western (white) people… for example, non-white people who move to a new country are immediately called “immigrants.” They don't get to be called an expat. But in reality, the people who move to Bali from other places are actually immigrants… they're looking for a better life. One of the first times we hung out, you were like, “I never really felt like I belonged here” because, obviously, you're not native to here. So how has that changed, and how do you feel now with all these other immigrants and people… your sense of belonging to Bali?
Carina: Great question. I feel a simultaneous sense of belonging and outsiderness my whole life here. Growing up I was friends with our Balinese neighbors in the village we live in. So I grew up speaking the local language like a local. It feels like a super power to speak Balinese, it’s an intimate knowing of this place that goes way deeper than the national language, Bahasa Indonesian, which is everyone’s second language they learn in school anyway. I haggle at the market, and I talk shit with the ladies in the kitchen, and have a sort of deeper sense of familialism with the local community and in Bahasa Bali. It makes me feel connected to it here. Though there is a forever outsiderness I think that it is simultaneously just a privilege to be able to move outside and be in a part of other worlds. I really have two feet in two worlds because of being raised here. Even though I loved this life, I still hankered for “normalcy” as depicted by the movies, like “having my own locker in the halls of a public high school” type of situation. In Bali, everything is really exceptional. No standards, everything on its head all the time. Over time, I feel like I’ve found a sense of rootedness and belonging in Bali that I think stems from a more grounded and rootedness in myself, and my choice to call this place my home. Not just the place I grew up - to really identify with making this the place I want to live.
Tavish: My first thought is that the framing of the question, or reorienting of using “expat” to “immigrant” is interesting because it kind of throws the question of what is an immigrant into light. And I think that immigrants fundamentally are moving from their home country to find a better life. So there's a freedom from, and a freedom to, aspect of immigration.
I think that in the past, because of whatever reasons, that largely meant looking for freedom from political oppression and freedom to earn more money. I think that the immigrants or the expats are moving here from a “freedom from” and a “freedom to” perspective. And I think the “freedom from” is not so much overt totalitarian or fascist regimes or whatever, and the “freedom to” isn't a freedom to earn money… But it's a freedom from the sort of trappings of industrial urban life, and it's a freedom to search for a viable alternative outside of that.
Carina: My parents definitely did that. Tavish did that. So I'm sort of a product of my parents, and I saw Tavish wanting that. And I wasn't certain that I wanted to come here and live here forever. But literally seeing this place through his eyes - that refreshed view, that isn't my family's eyes, and that isn't my own, has made me love this place so much more and choose this place. Not just like, “I'm here because I'm a Bali kid.” I actively choose to be here. I love to choose to be here because of the way that I'm able to see it and experience it, much thanks to his eyes and way of loving.
Since you grew up with a family of jewelers, did you ever think you would choose it as a career path?
Carina: I always loved to make jewelry as a kid. I would hang out in my parents' workshop and pick things to make for special occasions. I did silversmithing as an after school activity and would make gifts like a dragonfly pendant with “I love you Mom” stamped down the spine, or a first tooth fairy box to house all the teeth I lost. I just liked to make things.
My parents had a banging business, but at that age I didn’t really think “oh someday I’ll be part of that too.” They exited the business before any of those dreams grew. After they sold, I didn't think of jewelry at all, they had made some incredibly beautiful things and I wasn’t about to do it as a business, it wasn't something that I had really imagined. I loved costumes and dress up - I liked having my body be a vehicle for expression. And that led me to make a piece of jewelry, which was supposed to be a subversive, cheeky, art-challenging-the-patriarchy-object that I wore at my nipple, the Elppin brooch. Making this piece started a lot of conversations in the realm of women talking about women's bodies - I got really jazzed. Jewelry was a natural evolution from this one piece. I was loving on the motif and wanted to stack more of these eye/nipple shaped hammered metal pieces all over me. This really started as an art project that I kept feeling good to continue to pursue.
Why shift from Elppin to Carina Hardy?
Carina: Maturation from girlhood to womanhood, knowing when to adopt something that you feel like you're ready to move on from. Not doing things alone anymore. Elppin was the thing I started myself. This is the thing that we're doing together.
Tavish: I think Carina already touched on it, but like the transition from kind of overt in your face, radical, patriarchal gaze against the breast, reflect the gaze, the mission - very loud, very overt, very provocative to a sort of, more subtle, elegant, and covert form of sublimating patriarchal power. And I think that the Elppin name doesn't allow for the sort of aesthetic and personal or artistic development that Carina wants to engage in or that we want to engage in. And so as an eponymous brand, you can kind of equate the designer with the brand itself and then their evolution, because it's basically a perspective. It's an outlook. It's a viewpoint on the world. You can equate that with the brand's growth.
It's the move. Once I saw the refreshed Instagram and the new website it was game over. You're never gonna look back really. Well, now you just have to get rid of inventory. But once the inventory's gone, that's over. People are lucky actually to have that early youthful vibe. Now this is a woman vibe.
Carina: I think that there's also something to be said about intention.The intention with Elppin was art project, conversation, pushing the envelope and having these uncomfortable conversations. The intention with Carina Hardy is to make art, but have it be wearable by people in the world and have it be a business. And have that be the honest intention for it, not for me to forever be the nipple girl.
What's your creative process like?
Carina: We design everything together - constantly inspired by everything around us. And we take ideas and jump straight to model making, working live in 3D we make adjustments in real time. We are lucky to be able to do this by having master carvers with us in the studio, and we talk back and forth all day long. Our designs are not completely preconceived. We never really know exactly what we want until it unfolds in front of us.
We often start by playing with something we’re excited about in form first before figuring out how to place this idea into a piece of jewelry. This process is really apparent with a lot of the things that we've made for example The Women of Willendorf, we just made her and then it was like, holy shit, she needs to go in a spinner. And you need to see her whole thing. Front and back. So that idea finds its’ place in a piece of jewelry by having a 3D model in wax we can hold and wear and feel.
Do you have any challenges being partners creatively, in business, and personally? Do you feel like you just flow well together? Because you're with each other all day and then you go home and you're with each other.
Tavish: All in all, it's incredibly romantic. I don't view conflict as something inherently negative. Running a business together puts the relational and individual dynamics under pressure. So you essentially expedite the chemical processes of combustion. So the shit tends to pop up much quicker than it would if you just had two separate jobs, a few hours to spend with each other in the nights, or on the weekends. But over the last years of being with each other every single day, I believe that we've developed some really good practices for both of us, and then also ourselves as individuals. We can come here and give this our best, but then take enough time away from this to kinda recharge. It’s practice around communication because we're always having ideas. But asking the question, like “Hey. Can I talk to you about this thing right now?” Instead of just saying what your idea is. That’s one small micro example.
Yeah, that’s the same with me and Lucien, because we’re always together. When you started your work it was very women and body focused. Why is that such a strong intention for the work?
Carina: Because women are embodied creatures - I would argue more so than our counterparts. We have cycles. We give life. We hold a whole circle in ourselves at once.
Our experience and our bodies really shapes the experience we share with the people around us, and creates the world at large. So to engage in your body and to actually have conversations or pieces that evoke conversation about bodies, I think that's really empowering because it fundamentally challenges and questions and digs into why things are the way that they are.
The art practice with doing body casting is how I got body focused. I really am turned on and excited by women's stories. A lot of women's stories of strength come from their body. From birth, to knowing what your body can do, and how “I got it and I wanna flaunt it, but I also need to protect myself.” There's a whole spectrum in our bodies that we have to figure out and work through.
So what's your relationship with your body and your hair? I don't know if people always ask you about your hair, if that's annoying. But I want to know! Because it's obviously something you care for and have taken a long time to grow.
Carina: I've always had long hair since I was a kid. I only ever cut it to my boobs when I was 12 and really rebellious and said “it was my body, my choice.” My dad was devastated. But since then I’ve had longer and longer hair, it's easy for me to have long hair and to maintain it. Honestly it's just genetic and I'm lucky.
What about your body?
Carina: I grew up feeling not very comfortable in my body. I was always a little heavier, chubbier and felt insecure. I guess being insecure is an experience of being a woman. But I always felt strong, like I was big boned, and had a will to wield power in my body. In the last couple of years, I feel like I have gotten to know my body more and change prior behavioral patterns. I used to (and sometimes still do!) just eat impulsively all the time, all the time, all the time. And once I met Tavish and actually felt full from love, I didn't feel like I needed to eat constantly. But it still comes up, when I'm stressed or angry or impulsive or whatever, I go straight to food.
That's what I do too.
Carina: And the feeling of being full was so new and so different and actually just came from feeling really loved. Feeling loved in turn has helped me feel good in my body. For loving my body in all of its shapes and sizes, but actually feeling like I can tune in to what my body wants, rather than what I do to self-soothe.
Not a lot of people are able to articulate that the way that you just did. Or even be aware that’s what they’re doing. I sometimes still do it, but it's changed now.
Carina: Maybe that goes into being hyper aware of our bodies as being American women and feeling ashamed of it. And the cycle of binge eating… it’s like immediate love. Because it makes you feel good. Your brain is like “you should eat to feel good because that's how we survive,” it’s artificially giving you stuff, and then you feel bad afterwards. But then you just do it again. Crazy.
How has Tavish changed the brand?
Carina: Oh, Tavish has made it a brand. He has always asked questions. “Why? For what reason are we doing this? What's the goal? What's the intention?” I think for a long time I was making for the sake of it, like women do… making to fill my flurry. Having fun but not having a goal beyond the individual interactions with the pieces.
He brings a ton of structure and meaning to what we're doing. He has a really strong and deep understanding of the whole thing, since I first met him. Literally, on our first date, he was like putting on the Dozen Nipple Necklace because he was like, “this is dope.” He got it. It wasn't something I needed to convince him about, from the very beginning.
He saw it, got it, and became a huge supporter. He really pushes it creatively, and wants to do things that you don't see anywhere else. That's something Tavish is interested in doing - creating beautiful things that you're not gonna find anywhere else. And that has shaped a lot of the things that we've made and we are making.
We're building a team, we’re growing, most of it because of his involvement.
What has this project morphed into now?
Carina: Staying in tune with beauty, our primary love language. Tavish and I fell in love pointing out beautiful things to each other that we’d marvel and oogle at together. We have further fine tuned this muscle to see so much beauty more presently and compounded too. We root our practice in Balinese principles that help guide us to goodness by finding harmony with each other, nature and the sacred. Always calling in this triad of questions to connect us back to what matters. We want everything we do to be in the name of love. If not, why do it? We make limited edition pieces because we want to continue to find joy in creating new things. We want our work to feel deeply human, so we stay faithful to handcraft and the marks that tell our stories.
What are you inspired by?
Carina: What I’m inspired by, and what’s coming are expressed in one of the next collections we’re working, “how can we dive into the different phases of womanhood?” I’m interested in stories of the child, stories of teenagers from being a Femme Fatal, in the maiden stage, to falling in love, going into motherhood, being pregnant, being a wise woman and an elder.
So how can we find representations that resonate to these stages of womanhood - to create something that women can sort of peg and hold on to, as different coming of age gifts. Because when I first did the Elppin brooch, my idea for it was, “how cool would this have been if I had been given this when I first got boobs when I was 12?” That would have been dope. Maybe my posture wouldn't have collapsed. Maybe I could actually stand proud and have this as a thing that honored my developmental change or said that it was okay to be initiated into something.
In the modern context of communities - that don't necessarily have deep cultural ties and traditions of initiation into the different stages of womanhood - I think that is a really exciting place to design into. And we're already having so much fun with Venus, so that's just one phase. The love, sensuality, romance… which can be throughout your whole life, but the different phases I'm excited about.
Y’all are rewriting these stages… you have something for everybody. So then what's next?
Tavish: I think gangsters move in silence. The important thing is that we try to develop a team that can support us, that can support Carina so that she can be creative. Because what happened was… she created the first collection and then spent the next 3 years trying to run a business, sell, and didn't come up with another collection. And she's not in this to run a business and do administrative work. So we're trying to build a team so that we can actually do the fun stuff.
You're stranded on a desert island with 3 snacks. What are they?
Tavish: It’s like seaweed, scotch. Why not? Single malt scotch. Seaweed.
Carina: Let’s do jerky/chocolate/whiskey rather than seaweed. That works much better. Jerky instead of seaweed.
Usually when I do this Ziran Muse series, I’m talking to people that inspire me but don’t have any Ziran, but you were actually a Ziran customer before we became friends. So I'm wondering what draws you to Ziran… how do you feel wearing the pieces?
Carina: Oh my god. Well I wanted to be friends with you since I found Ziran and I'm so glad it worked out that we're friends. This could have not worked out.
It goes both ways, you know. It could have not worked.
Carina: I remember sitting on a sofa. It was COVID 2020. I found your Instagram and was like, “this SILK is the coolest thing in the world.”
I feel amazing in Ziran because of the silk and the patterns. I can just feel the spirit and soul of the pieces, literally, through the screen. It's jumping out at you. So I feel like a badass wearing them because I also really like wearing things that are like a suit, like a jumpsuit or the same color or very monochromatic. Just a complete look, and I love that you design for that specifically.
Tavish: Your color palette is amazing. You're doing something that's totally unique. When Carina showed me it was like, “what the fuck is that?” That's such an amazing question to ask when you see something. And you're not taking the easy route. The result is testament to that.
Thank you. Ok last question! Ziran comes from Daoism, it’s the 35th chapter. It means to be, “natural, spontaneous, and free. To push away outside influence, embrace your own authenticity.”
The original quote from the Daodejing is “Man follows Earth, Earth follows Heaven, Heaven follows the Dao, the Dao follows its own ways, Ziran.” Akin to Nirvana to Buddhism, Ziran is that free and ultimate state of being to Daoism.
Do you feel that you live natural, spontaneous, and free? Creatively, in your personal life together as a couple, whatever?
Carina: Tavish does that best of all. I think that what we do in business and the way we are in love is that as well, completely.
~
Creative Direction + Words: Kelly Wang Shanahan (@theziran)
Muses: Carina Hardy + Tavish Gallagher (@carinahardy.studio)
Photography: Jessica Foley (@fauxly)
Shot in Ubud, Bali. March 2024.