Samantha Wills - Of Gold and Dust: A memoir of a creative life

Some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals.

First published in 2021

Copyright Samantha Wills 2021

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or 10 per cent of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to the Copyright Agency (Australia) under the Act.

Every effort has been made to trace the holders of copyright material. If you have any information concerning copyright material in this book please contact the publishers at the address below.

Allen & Unwin

83 Alexander Street

Crows Nest NSW 2065

Australia

Phone:(61 2) 8425 0100

Email:

Web:www.allenandunwin.com

ISBN 978 1 76087 654 8

eISBN 978 1 76087 443 8

Internal design by Simon Paterson; handwritten elements by Samantha Wills

Set by Bookhouse, Sydney

For my nieces,

Naya and Anas

Did you know that the name given to the movement of petals in response to darkness is nyctinasty?the closing of a flower at night. Its somewhat unfortunate that a definition so beautiful could have such a sharp and dissonant title. Jarring pronunciation aside, the concept of a flower opening in the light and retreating in darker times is as much a human response as it is botanical. It is the very make up of our experiences that sees us made of gold and dust, our elation and our grief. Our daylight and our midnights. Nothing faces the sun all of the time.

Often throughout my career, I have been asked to explain my overnight success. How the Samantha Wills jewellery brand went from Bondi market table to the international stage, seemingly in a flash. I have long resented the question, and eventually my answer became: It took me twelve years to be an overnight success. Most people appreciated this response, while others thought I was simply being facetious. I wasnt. It took me no less than twelve years to find success. But what is success, anyway? The very definition of it has changed in my mind many times over the yearsthe only steadfast truth that I know about it is that the closer you get to it, the more it looks nothing like you thought it would when you first set out to reach it.

I have known for a long while that the Samantha Wills jewellery brand had a following that extended beyond lovers of accessories. Within that following, there was also a large community of (predominantly female) entrepreneurs, who, like me, were building their own creative enterprise.

It is because of this that I want to share more of the bits in between. Not just the outward-facing yardsticks of success that people have no doubt seen on Instagram or in the press, and also not just the hardships. Because while I feel providing transparency on both is important, what is not often spoken about is the human element. The parallel experience of it all. When the success of a milestone was being celebrated publicly, what was it that was going on personally? What did the silence behind the applause sound like? What happened in the moments between the inhale and the exhale? Thats what the stories on these pages are. Im sure I dont have to tell anyone that it wasnt all highlight reels and high fives. What it takes to build a commercially successful brand has to have an impact on all that surrounds a private life. As above, so belowthey do not operate independently from each other.

The Universe only ever has three answers for us: yes, not right now or I have something better in store for you. I have long loved those words, but it took me a great amount of time to really understand the true power of this guidance and an even greater amount of time to truly accept it. And to accept it means to surrender what you think the outcome should look like. For so long I know I was unable to do that, both professionally and, even more so, personally. For the majority of my years, I defined success by whether an outcome happened in the way I hoped it would, in the time I thought it should. What an anxiety-filled and rigid way to exist, dont you agree?

What I came to realise in writing these pages was that the tighter I held on to a set outcome, the more strongly anxiety hugged me back, sometimes embracing me so tightly I struggled to even breathe. Author and teacher Caroline Myss once wrote, Just let go. Let go of how you thought your life should be, and embrace the life that is trying to work its way into your consciousness. That advice really reached me throughout the many (many!) months spent immersed in the writing of this book. It was as though laying each word onto the page was a surrender of sorts, a white flag between me and the experiences in my life that maybe didnt go the way I thought they would. The ink on these pages enabled me to see my experiencesparticularly the ones that didnt go to my planfor the guidance, redirection and resilience that each brought. Even through the acceptance of this, it doesnt lessen the disappointment or the pain that a long midnight brings, but the certainty with midnights is darkness, and with darkness also arrives the opportunity for alchemy.

I have long been fascinated by alchemyas a jewellery designer, it really appealed to me that there was a word for the process by which base metals are converted into gold. I felt the word richly and poetically captured the truth and beauty of my craftpatina metals and bleeding hands that, together, produce sparkling, decadent objects that women adorn themselves with as glam armour. Over the years, though, I also started to appreciate the secondary and emotive part of alchemy, a magical process of transformation, creation or combination.

This transcended the physical or the obvious; it is the alchemy of the human spirit as it travels through the ranges and depths of emotions and experiences, from the dark, dusty hollows, and leads eventually, if we choose to go there, into a golden light that envelopes and recharges the fibres of our very being. It moves us forward. Alchemy comes from the ebb and flow of the human experience. It is not the highlight at the end of a cycle, it is the full spectrum of the experience in and of itself. It is the shadows that take us to the ocean floor, it is the broken hearts that shackle us, the almost-but-not-quite circumstances that we think are hindering our path, blocking us from where we are meant to be going. But they are not blocking it at all. They are the path. That is the process.

Its a true honour to be able to share my story with you. Having a career in the arts, I have worked across many of their disciplines, and the art of storytelling may very well be my favourite. This is because it is through storytelling that we are able to recognise parts of our own story in anothers. If you recognise parts of your own story on these pages, I hopeif nothing elseit brings you a certain kind of calmness, and reminds you that wherever you are on your journey, whether your petals are facing the sun right now or retreating due to what feels like a particularly long night, this too shall pass. I also hope some of these stories might reach you like a hug or a little wink, and in doing so, no matter if you are in light or in darkness, in gold or in the dustthat some of the words on the following pages reassure you that what is meant for you is making its way to you right now. Right this very moment, you are exactly where you are meant to be.