Dreams into Reality

By Anna Grace Moore

Photos by Blair Ramsey

Faith acts as the fuel to ignite one’s call to action–her ability to turn dreams into reality. For the founder and principal designer behind A.Edge Designs, Amy Edgerton, such a journey is one worth pursuing.

Hailing from McMinnville, Tennessee, Amy first came to Birmingham in 1992 to attend Birmingham-Southern College. After graduating, she moved to Nashville for occupational therapy school and returned after receiving her degree to work as an occupational therapist in the Magic City.

Amy says Birmingham–Homewood specifically–just always felt like home. It is also where she established both of her careers–in occupational therapy and in designing her own jewelry line.

Fast forward to 2016, and Amy, struggling to balance working full-time and raising two children, decided to work part-time. While looking for ways to supplement her income from home, Amy says she remembered discovering a beautiful but expensive pair of earrings at a boutique.

“I remember thinking, ‘I can’t spend that much money, but I wonder if I can try to make some,’” Amy says. “I literally drove straight to Hobby Lobby. I started making some for myself, and then, I would make them for friends.”

As Amy’s hobby grew, so did her confidence. Ironically, she says it never dawned on her to monetize her new talent because entrepreneurship–at the time–seemed so intimidating.

With the encouragement of a friend, Amy opened A.Edge Designs’ Instagram account in June 2018 to simply “see what would happen.” To her surprise, numerous people–many of them working moms like herself–were eager to support her business.

Finally in January 2021, Amy took a leap of faith and retired from occupational therapy to run A.Edge Designs full-time.

“If you had asked me 20 years ago about owning a jewelry company, I would laugh, but here we are,” Amy says. “The part that I really appreciate is the flexibility. I’m just a happier person by being able to balance life better.”

Not only are Amy’s designs unique, but lots of her materials are also sourced from different countries around the world such as Turkey. She utilizes minerals, metals, leather, suede, beads and more, and each piece–often made from scratch–is a small hallmark of her innate talent.

“Sometimes, I feel like I have writer’s block, and there are days where it is just not coming to me,” Amy says of creating collections. “Sometimes, I have to let go and do something different.”

Each piece is a labor of love as Amy says it can sometimes take several hours for her to design and create even one pair of earrings. Her feathered earrings, for example, are hand-cut from leather hides and are hand-painted before being fastened to the ring clasps.

One top-selling item is the guardian angel necklace, which features a gold-colored angel wing pendant hanging from a loop and cross attached to a trombone link chain. Often inspired by trending fashion, Amy says she has challenged herself to create outside the box for her more eclectic customers.

The filigree elephant earrings–offered both in white and matte silver–are created through the filigree technique, which involves soldering together metals to create beautiful motifs, or in Amy’s case, the Crimson Tide’s mascot. Another fan favorite–the marella ring–is gold-colored metal that is flattened and rounded to create depth on one’s finger, meaning it is an attention-praising piece.

While Amy designs and creates all of her own lines, she has had customers request custom orders.

“People can come over to my studio, and we can design their own piece,” Amy says. “We could pick out colors, and we could pick out style. I could make it right there on the spot.”

One of Amy’s favorite memories creating jewelry came not at a show, but in fact on the morning of a customer’s wedding. The bride surprised her bridesmaids by inviting Amy to host a jewelry bar, where each of the bridesmaids could pick out materials for Amy to create their customizations as bridesmaid gifts.

“Working with my hands and just creating–there’s something about it that’s very peaceful to me,” Amy says. “Even as an occupational therapist, which is a very creative job, I’ve always steered toward that creative side. It’s kind of surreal sometimes to see people wearing my jewelry.”

Although most of Amy’s customers buy her designs for themselves or as gifts, many may not realize just how much thought is incorporated into each unique piece. According to the AP News article, “Families detail stress, terror and sadness after Nashville school shooting in court documents,” a mass shooting occurred at The Covenant School in Nashville on March 27, 2023.

The assailant–28-year-old Audrey Hale–shot and killed six people before she was killed on scene by responding police officers. While in graduate school, Amy lived close to The Covenant School, so years later hearing about this tragedy, she became distraught and wanted to help victims and their families.

“It hit even closer to home for me,” Amy says of the tragedy. “St. Benedict symbolizes protection. I know it’s just a necklace, but it was my way of letting them know that God is protecting them.”

Amy began creating this gold-colored pendant necklace, which pictures St. Benedict, after the tragedy. Not only did she help raise awareness of the pressing concerns surrounding school shootings through her jewelry sales, but she also helped pray for the victims and their families, encouraging her customers’ support, too.

No matter the jewelry, Amy says each piece is created with a purpose: To remind her customers that they are loved, beautiful and are called to do great things here on Earth. Symbolically, Amy says she helped discover part of her purpose, relying on faith and opening A.Edge Designs.

If Amy never took that step, she never would have been able to prioritize being a wife and mom, putting her family’s needs first. She also would have never honed in on her passion for design, never scratching her itch to create.

Amy believes her testimony is physically manifested in each pair of earrings or rings her customers wear. She hopes whenever her customers wear A.Edge Designs that they not only feel beautiful, but they also realize what a beautiful life they are helping Amy to achieve.

“I feel so blessed that I found something that I love to do but can still financially support my family and be here whenever they need me,” Amy says. “I am constantly in awe of how supportive people are to me and to my business.”

Looking forward, Amy says she hopes to continue creating inventive designs–inspired by and for her customers. She hopes that other mothers especially will view her story as a catalyst to create–to pursue their own passions, choosing to face each roadblock as simply a stone over which to hurdle.

After all, the only difference between dreamers and doers is the faith to try something new.

To view Amy’s work or inquire about purchasing, visit aedgedesigns.com.