As lovers of faux bois, it’s obvious that nature is the greatest inspiration. Although our blog focuses on inspiration from trees, we wanted to highlight a friend and local LA artist that also finds inspiration from nature. The results are always translated in totally modern, beautiful, and fascinating ways- Karen Kimmel. What we love most about her work is her fresh and unexpected color combinations. The above image was taken at her studio the last time we visited.

Her pieces are composed of organic shapes, layers, and multiple mediums and many of them are a result of intricate performance installations that involve several steps and processes. It’s a little hard to sum up in a sentence or paragraph, (and personally, we’re not even sure we could explain it) but just take a look at her work or experience one of her installations and you’ll know you’ve witnessed something special.

Recently she’s been exploring the the techniques of traditional crafts, such as needlepoint, paper cutting, and Ikebana but considering them in non traditional ways. Her work has been featured in numerous galleries (she currently has some pieces at the Treywick Gallery in SF) and she’s done some amazing collaborative pieces with organizations including Nike, Creative Growth, Paper Magazine, and the Phoenix School for the Deaf.

Earlier this year, she created a limited edition customized bag for Fendi which was auctioned off to benefit LACMA. We recently spoke with Karen and she shared that she’s currently working on a bunch of fun new projects and collaborations, including some new herb planters (pictured below).

Karen is definitely one to watch, and you can keep tabs on her as she also recently joined the blogging team at lipsticktracez.com- an art, music, culture website by women for women. There’s so much more of her work at her website- karenkimmel.com

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