The Talented Chainmaille Specialists at B3
Blue Buddha Boutique, a diverse line of chainmaille supplies and finished jewelry, was launched by self-taught artist Rebeca Mojica in 2003. First operated out of Rebeca's spare bedroom as a one-woman business, Blue Buddha has grown to a staff of several full- and part-time employees, with interns and guest contributors helping the company thrive. Originally handling only local orders, the company now has customers in all 50 states and nearly 40 countries. Blue Buddha prides itself on outstanding customer service, precision-sized rings, and amazing chainmaille designs.
Good employees and excellent leadership are crucial for any successful business. Blue Buddha is proud to have a very dedicated and talented team. Take a moment and get to know more about each employee below.
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Nadja Aller Nadja keeps the staff on target to meet daily, weekly and monthly goals. She has spent a good chunk of time inputting data and tweaking our database so that our systems will be fully integrated. Her efficiency & down-to-earth brain is a good counterbalance to Rebeca's flurry of artsy ideas. Nadja joined B3 with a long history in retail but as a novice in chainmaille so she jumped in and started learning weaves right away. She spends her spare time being a terrible cat lady, dealing in vintage home goods, posing 1:6 scale figures, constant reading, watching cartoons and martial arts films and being very domestically inclined. Nadja enjoys nothing more than Hank Sr. and achieving perfect Paulette Goddard hair. That's the stuff. She is also fully dedicated to keeping Blue Buddha the best place to work in the known Universe. |
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Jenna Deidel Jenna maintains our social networking profiles, helps maintain our blog, and works hard to make sure the Blue Buddha brand shines through all our marketing materials. She also takes some of our Blue Buddha photographs, including the step-by-step photos for Rebeca's book CHAINED. Jenna moved to Chicago from Boulder, CO in 2003 and attended Columbia College Chicago where she attained a BA in Photography and a minor in dance. While her day to day dealings at B3 rarely exercise the latter (although they have on occasion!) she is proud to have put her BA to good use as the step-by-step project photographer for Rebeca's book, CHAINED. In addition to her work as B3's Social Branding Coordinator & Marketing Assistant, Jenna is an independent professional tap dance artist in the midst of co-founding a non-profit organization that will focus on the development of fellow tap dance artists and changing the culture of tap dance in Chicago. |
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Emily Fiks Tens of thousands of rings pass through Emily's hands for quality control each day she's here, and she also helps pack many customer orders. Thanks to her efforts, we are able to ship a growing number of orders each day. Emily came to Blue Buddha as an inventory assistant in the summer of 2008. Originally arriving here nearly oblivious to chainmaille jewelry, Emily started to feel addicted after one class at Lillstreet. Although jewelry inventory seems to take up most of her spare time, a lot is spent in school full time. Currently Emily is pursing a degree in English and a minor in Art History at Northeastern Illinois University. Besides school and work Emily loves vintage clothes—buying, wearing, sewing, and altering. She also loves animals, cooking, and 70s/80s punk, and power pop. |
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Jennifer Hohe The monumental task of controlling inventory stock levels and overseeing quality control is in Jen's hands. She is responsible for purchasing and protecting our inventory—all 10 million or so rings that are in our studio at any given time! She works with our vendors and ringmakers to continually improve the quality of our jump rings and other supplies. While pursuing her degree in Art at Northeastern Illinois University, Jen took a Metals class out of interest, immediately fell in love with the medium, and has since attained her BA in Small Metals/Jewelry. Jen is addicted to the painstaking, step-by-step processes involved in creating wearable pieces of art. In addition to making jewelry, Jen enjoys creating small-scale sculptures and two-dimensional framed metal "paintings". Her work is influenced by themes of nostalgia, emotion, and sentimentality. She hopes to one day have her own little space to sell her work. |
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Matt Hucke Matt keeps the web servers running, installs software on them, and does all the custom programming necessary to keep the orders flowing smoothly. Originally from the St. Louis area, Matt has lived in Chicago since 1993. In 1996, he created the "Graveyards of Illinois" web site at http://graveyards.com/. This led to a collaboration with author Ursula Bielski, resulting in their book, "Graveyards of Chicago", being published in 1999. He continues to explore graveyards at every opportunity. |
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Artie Keefe Artie was the first employee hired to help with orders back in 2007. Although he moved out of state for a few years, he is now back and is helping Blue Buddha Boutique achieve our goal of shipping most orders within two business days without sacrificing quality. He has created many creative signs for the B3 studio; keep an eye out for them the next time you're in the shop! Artie is a Chicagoland native, but a love of travel took him away from Blue Buddha Boutique for a few years. He managed to keep up with his sorting skills during his absence, most notably on an organic farm in Wisconsin. He originally came to Blue Buddha through a fluke search on Craigslist, but loved it so much that he could never really leave. Artie is an intermittent crafter, and still a beginner at chainmaille weaving. His other interests include gardening, philosophy, biking, primitive living, and quickly sorting thousands of tiny shiny things into baggies. |
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Maximillian Otto Lapine Max sifts through our non-colored base metals, quality controlling them and weighing out pack quantities, so they are pre-bagged and ready to go for our Internet orders. To the delight of his co-workers, he is always ready to jump in with comic relief when things get a bit crazy in the office. Conceived because his parents “had a deal”, Max was born in Rochester, NY and moved to Chicago to go to Columbia College to study acting in 2004. Quite a change from his beginnings as pre-law, but he wanted the big bucks. After graduating he moved to LA for a short time, found the dream wasn't there and then promptly returned to Chicago's loving arms. Max is an actor and a writer and has performed throughout the city. He is a proud member of the comedy troupe “The Sean Miller Explosion”, a perennial favorite at the Chicago Sketch Comedy festival. Max found B3 by way of Craigslist and had no idea of what he was about to be a part of. Max sifts through our base metals and make sure they're as good as they can be, and it never stops... He also bets that we are a collection of the best-looking people in this industry. |
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Aimee Leang The friendly voice who answers most of our calls and helps you complete your phone orders belongs to Aimee. She helps fulfill orders, restock supplies, and ensures that customers are fully satisfied with their B3 experience. Aimee Leang's jewelry making obsession began at her first summer job working for Gallery 37's jewelry making program. After that Aimee's Mom gave her a set of tools and her creativity took off. Aimee is well versed in the skills of wire-wrapping, metalsmithing and lapidary. She still continues to take lessons and looks forward to increasing her awareness in the chainmaille arts. Having an eye for detail, Aimee enjoys helping out at B3 and is proud to be part of such an incredible team. |
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Lisa Rosenberg Lisa joined the Blue Buddha Boutique team in September 2010. She originally started off as a seasonal worker, but we loved her so much we decided to hire her permanently. She helps fill orders, even coming in on Sundays to help keep our orders queue under control! An avid crafter and certified graphic artist, Lisa Rosenberg comes to B3 with a love of all things jewelry. From her Metal Smith class to her various beading projects, Lisa is most at home being creative. She also enjoys collecting "Hello Kitty" and other toys from her youth, caring for orchids and other plants, reading mostly from the SF section, watching cartoons, and playing with her dog, Jasper. |
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Daniel Rychtarik Dan is Blue Buddha's "Color Guy" as of 2011 and with said title comes great responsibility. If there are anodized aluminum rings that dwell within the walls of Blue Buddha, he is tasked to ensure that the strict quality control standards are met so he can then weigh and pre-bag orders for everyone's wants and needs. Dan is a Chicagoland native. Being relatively new to the world of chainmaille, Dan has taken the metaphoric bull by the horns. In the beginning it was good. He was given the chance of an apprenticeship under a better mailler than himself. From then on, little did he know, his life was going to take a turn for the best. Now Dan and his tutor share the same chainmaille shop at the Bristol Renaissance Fair. Dan would say his best chainmaille work is done with anodized aluminum and rubber rings. Some of Dan's other hobbies and passions are fire spinning for the Chicago Fire Tribe, Tae Kwon Do, Welding, Paintball, Spray Paint Art and The Rubik's Cube. And he couldn't be more excited to become a member of the Blue Buddha team. |
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Jason Scerena Jason joined our team in October 2009 and is responsible for anodizing niobium and keeping our pre-bagged inventory well-stocked. Born not so long ago, in a land not too far away, Jason was drawn to the city of Chicago for it's rich culture and proximity to home. He attended the Illinois Institute of Art where her obtained a Bachelors of Fine Arts in digital media and animation. You will soon be able to see his work at JasonScerena.com. He has a variety of hobbies and interests which include shiny objects, painting miniatures, pretending, growing plants, comics, learning, yard sales, art, geology, mythology, funology. Being an avid game player and a fantasy aficionado, he was no stranger to chainmaille's protective capabilities, but was surprised that it had applications outside armour. He's proud to be a part of our growing team. |
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Erik Watson Erik is our shipping machine! He does a triple-check on orders as he packs them to make sure customers receive exactly what they ordered. He also creates all the shipping labels and sends shipping confirmations to our customers. Erik traveled to Columbus, Ohio to study illustration, then bounded off to San Francisco to study film. After four years of filmmaking in Los Angeles, Erik has returned to his hometown of Chicago as a freelance illustrator, keeping himself busy with screenwriting and post film production. His interests include reading books, making short films with friends and watching cartoons with his niece and three nephews. As a wearer and lover of handmade jewelry, Erik is very excited to be a part of the Blue Buddha team and is more than ready to process your orders! |
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Samm Watson Samm is Blue Buddha's "Mix Man," which means he creates our anodized aluminum and enameled copper mixes and keeps them well-stocked. In addition, he quality-controls tens of thousands of anodized aluminum rings each day. Hailing from the land of citrus, sunshine, and violent lightning storms, Samm received a degree in history from the University of Florida before traveling the world as a teacher, archaeologist, and amateur documentarian. His interests include reading, 80's hardcore punk and dance music, and repetitive tasks that would melt the brains of most people. Samm has seen Back to the Future more times than most people have watched the news, and is currently examining the best way to incorporate chainmaille onto his leather jacket. |
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Kathy (Kat) Wisniewski Kat has developed some of the best-selling kits and instructions we carry, including the Glass Caterpillar. She comes into the studio twice a week to help put together customer orders. Kat Wisniewski of Elemental Art Jewelry is an innovative jewelry artist and designer of riveting wire and chainmaille attire. Kat also enjoys teaching chainmaille & wirework, as she has done professionally since 2005 throughout the Chicagoland area, and also at the internationally recognized Bead&Button Show. Having invented about 9 weaves and chainmaille patterns featuring stylish glass and rubber rings, Kat has rapidly become a well-respected and nationally known expert in the field of modern chainmaille fashion. |
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