The Art of the Comb

The Way I Beachcomb

If you’ve followed my work for a while, you already know this: I don’t just walk a beach. I work a beach. Beachcombing is part instinct, part ritual, part muscle memory - a practice shaped by years of wandering New England shorelines with pockets full of glass, shoes full of sand, and a heart that always feels a little bit lighter by the water. 

People often ask me how I find the things I find. How I spot a pottery shard under a layer of storm-packed pebbles. How I can tell from twenty feet away whether a piece of glass is going to have that perfect frosted edge. So here it is - a look at the way I hunt, and why it’s become such an essential part of my creative life.

I Let the Tide Decide the Day

There’s something about low tide on a cold morning that feels like an invitation. The beach is quiet, the shoreline stretched thin and exposed, and the ocean has done the heavy lifting - tumbling, polishing, and delivering treasures right where I can reach them.

I pay attention to tides the way some people check the weather. I know which beaches reveal their secrets only at dead low, and which ones give up their good stuff right as the tide is turning back in. It’s all rhythm and timing - you learn to read the coastline the way you read a palm.

Storms Are the Real Artists

People think sunny days are the best days. They’re not - storms are.

The day after a storm is when you find the thick frosted whites, the deep greens, the pottery curves with history still clinging to them. I love those mornings when everything is damp, windswept, and a little wild. That’s when the shoreline feels alive… and generous.

I Don’t Rush the Walk

Beachcombing is slow. Purposefully slow.

I walk, then stop, then crouch, then sit, then sift, then wander off the path I meant to take because a glimmer caught my eye. Every beach has micro-pockets - little bowls of rock and shell where the ocean sorts things for you. I always check those twice.

Whenever I get to a beach, I tell myself, I’m not leaving until I’ve found at least one piece of sea glass. Some days I leave with a handful. Some days it’s only that one piece. But when it’s a good one - pottery with a blue remnant, a sugar starfish already passed, a curved shard from what might’ve been a mug handle - that single piece can inspire an entire mosaic.

I Trust My Eye (It’s Taken Years to Train)

Beachcombing has taught me how to see differently. You start noticing patterns most people miss - the way sea glass hides under kelp, the particular shine of a still-wet shard, the shape of something buried just enough that only instinct picks it up.

It’s the same instinct I use in my studio. I place shells or glass without overthinking. Once I know where it belongs, I glue it down. There’s a confidence in that kind of knowing - a creative trust I only developed because of all the hours spent walking the shoreline.

Every Piece Has a Mood

I don’t just look for “pretty.”

I look for character.

A jagged white with a frosty edge might become the highlight of a holiday tree. A thick green might anchor in a brightly colored mosiac. A pottery piece with an unexpected curve might sit on my desk for months until it suddenly tells me what it wants to be. 

Nothing about my process is random. I pick with intention because I create with intention.

The Ocean Shapes the Art

Everything I make starts with where the ocean leads me. My mosaics aren’t manufactured - they’re gathered, weathered, softened, and shaped long before they reach my hands. I’m just the one who finds these ocean gems and puts the pieces together.

Beachcombing is my meditation, my reset button, and the heartbeat behind every collection I create for Kell Bell’s Shells & Sea Glass. It’s why each piece I make feels personal - because it is. It comes from quiet mornings, stormy afternoons, frozen fingers, small miracles in the sand, and a love for the coastline that raised me.

This is why I beachcomb the way I do.

This is why I create the way I do.

And this is why every piece I release is, and always will be, created by the ocean.