Frances Stachl has moved her studio away from the river into the burgeoning arts precinct of Guyton St.
Now in a workshop / showroom called A Place For Hammers, Frances creates her exquisite style of jewellery.
"Hammers are one of my favourite things. Tools are the things that keep me interested in jewellery. You can never have too many hammers," she says. "I think I need 20, at least."
She does not have 20 yet. "That's low-grade hammerage."
From a cute riveting hammer, through nylon mallets of different sizes to a chunky hammer with weight and grunt, the line-up means business.
"I do lots of forming and hammering stuff, and it's one of the things I go back to if I get bored. When I first left tech I wanted to mill all my own metal — it's a fun process but time consuming."
Her workshop is also equipped with such things as the obligatory vice and a hand-operated machine called a roller mill — a large mangle used to reduce metal to various thicknesses.
"I mostly use it to mill plate, so I buy stock-sized plate and mill it down to the size I want, so you're not carrying a lot of different sizes.
Frances began her art career as a painter.
"Mum was a painter and I didn't know what else to do, so that's what I did. It was like osmosis.
"I went to art school for a couple of years, but you have to work really hard to be a good painter." She says making jewellery is something she cares about a lot more: It's more visceral.
"I think I probably operate from my gut. And I know the idea of oxidised silver is not especially beautiful to people, but the things I think are aesthetically pleasing are almost ugly."
Her customers, mostly women, are a broad age group. Frances wears her own jewellery.
"I was really surprised when I moved back here at how supportive the local community is. It is a really nice thing about being in a town like this — it's astonishingly supportive of its arts."
Frances says she gets emotional after Artists Open Studios when she considers "how loved we are".
Whanganui was home, but she moved away for 15 years, returning when she needed to.
"It's your home town, so you feel safe, but you also get to decide who you are."
She operated for years beside the Whanganui River in a workshop in Moutoa Quay, but this move to Guyton St has given her a street presence and a showroom, while still keeping her studio in the forefront.
"I like the street, with the best hairdresser in town, just a few doors down, a lot of arts people, an independent bookshop up the road ... "
