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For this week’s Pressure Drop feature, we visited Union Crossing a creative home for artists, innovators, and the like in the Merrimack Valley. As one of the area’s premier artist communities, the Union Crossing artists and creatives are an active collective of innovators, business owners, thinkers, makers, and shakers. Union Crossing, located in a former Lawrence mill, coordinates the popular Lawrence Arts Crawl approximately 3 times each year, an event which invites artists, entrepreneurs, and local organizations in the community to open their spaces, share/sell their work, and celebrate the arts and cultural offerings in the city of Lawrence.

While visiting Union Crossing, we caught up with one of the collective’s artists, Emily O’Hara, whose Silver Labyrinth Design Group crafts custom jewelry in their third floor studio. There, Emily pursues her creative passions amidst the energy of kindred neighbors. A couple of years back, O’Hara traded in her scrubs as a maternal-child health nurse to devote her energies full time to her metals, her gemstones and her torch. ”This time here in my studio creating and working with my hands, it’s my step away. It absolutely changes the quality of my life. My bliss is expanding as I walk through my personal labyrinth of creativity beginning with childhood explorations then segueing to my career as a nurse, caring for women in their ultimate act of creation. That journey further progressed into my own act as a mother. These roles, along with a deep passion for weaving both fibers and later metals, informed my present vocation as a jewelry artist. As I continue to grow alongside my art I look forward to whatever path the future reveals.”

Custom designs by Silver Labyrinth can be viewed through their Facebook page. The public is invited to the next Arts Crawl scheduled for Friday October 30th and Saturday, October 31st.