By Jared Witherspoon
Photographed by Yusef Muhammad
Styled by Jared Witherspoon

Sarah Burack is a woman of many talents. There's the eclectic entrepreneur, who's the body & soul behind the valiant sustainable jewelry line, Pebble Studio. There's the prolific writer, who's honed her blog as a living, breathing guide for navigating culture & consumerism as a millennial. There's even the local fashion arbiter, who takes no shit & has a digital footprint longer than the Mississippi River.

From the 'illustrious' Stella Blues, following the release of her most recent jewelry collection "Metamorphosis," the 26-year-old St. Louis native sits down with Jared Witherspoon, local fashion photographer & friend, to talk about embracing change, the balance between labor & expression, & how to find your community.

JW = Jared Witherspoon

SB = Sarah Burack

JW: Sarah... Where are we right now?

SB: We're sitting outside Stella Blues, eating potstickers.

JW: & for the people that don't know, you are?

SB: My name's Sarah Burack & I'm the creator, founder, hands, heart, & mind behind Pebble Studio.

JW: Can you tell me a little bit about how you got started with the brand?

SB: I always knew I would have a lot of fun running an Instagram page, but, I didn't have the capacity for it when I was an undergraduate student. After graduating in 2018, I decided that I would make a business page for my art. It started with ceramic jewelry & eventually, I ended up taking a metal smithing class. About a year after I had started the Instagram page where I was just selling everything through DMs, things really leveled up from there & I decided it was time to make a website. After that, there was just sort of a natural progression of, I guess, expression? It wasn't just about selling adornments, but it was also about storytelling & sharing my worldview. It was about discovery & also sharing that with my community, whether it be an online community or the St. Louis community.

JW: & we met each other through a mutual friend, but didn't become super well acquainted until your last drop, "Metamorphosis," where you brought me in to do some photo work & whatnot. How do you feel about your last drop, specifically?

SB: Yes! Your photos turned out amazing. I'm really proud of that whole project because it felt really cohesive. I've done, maybe, four or five drops before this where I had a concept, &, I developed the art direction around it along with the photography, graphic design, & storytelling. I feel like all of those lessons I've learned from the other drops were really integrated into this one. & the reason this one felt so integrated is that I was able to envision what I wanted & let the theme sit in my mind for a couple of weeks before I actually started acting on it. There were also a lot of people involved this time & it was a lot of fun to create with others & be able to meet them eye to eye creatively. Lastly, the theme of metamorphosis is such a profound, almost, mantra for me of change & growth & making it okay that things don't stay the same.

JW: I want to touch a little bit on how you just mentioned embracing collaboration with this most recent drop. Aside from Pebble Studio being this great sustainable jewelry line, I think one of the things that I admire most about it is that it also doubles as this 'zeitgeist brand' for many Saint Louis creatives that you've sought to work with. Almost like a community, meant to showcase different local faces & talent in real-time. Is this something that you do intentionally or does it just happen?

SB: It's for sure intentional. & there are a couple of reasons behind this. The picture-perfect answer is that I want to be grounded in community. I think there's been a lot of discourse & sentiment around mutuality. If you look at the past couple of years, considering the pandemic, & all the changes, & confrontations surrounding race & class & economic status, the thing that kinda makes sense to me as a solution is being with others in a very local sense. I don't have control over the federal government, but, I do have control over who I talk to in my community. The less picture-perfect answer is that during 2020 I was doing a lot of sending jewelry to micro-influencers, which was really fun because it was like having pen pals. It was also nice to connect with creatives in that way to see how they were styling my items. But once my metal smithing became more developed & the materials themselves were more valuable, I was less willing to send something for free to someone that I didn't know. So then I started looking more towards the community in St. Louis.

JW: I was reading one of your blog posts prior to this interview, & one thing you touched on that I really resonated with is the idea of knowing yourself before transitioning to a bigger marketplace, such as New York or L.A. & how doing so can come with a lot of fear, anxiety, & even uncertainty, but also just a general lack of development. In what ways has embracing St. Louis as a community shaped the language of Pebble Studio? Do you feel like it's made your brand stronger?

SB: Yeah, people here are just much more down for collaboration. I feel like in St Louis, at least with the creatives that I've worked with, there's no hidden agenda. &, if we are 'using' each other, or have that agenda of say 'expanding audiences or borrowing aesthetic,' it's mutually shared & it's easier, to be honest about your goals when working together whereas in bigger cities it feels like people have to claw their way to the top. I'm not trying to go to the top. I'm just trying to connect with people, & I'm trying to feel a part of something.

JW: Definitely. Do you feel like Pebble Studio, as a brand, is of the Internet or one that chooses to embrace it?

SB: That's a good question. No, it's of the Internet, even though it's grounded in locality. It's inherently very much of the Internet. Pebble is very much about the posting of stories & seeing something exciting & sharing it with people immediately. & I feel like, because I grew up on the Internet, it naturally makes sense to me that people are going to look at my story for 5 seconds of their day. So, I'm not trying to take more than that, but I'm also really intentional about what I'm putting in front of other people's consciousness, honestly. & that's a form of play for me. It's not just the jewelry; it's also like, what are we putting in front of people?

JW: To add to that, even though Pebble Studio is this cultivated form of expression & play for you, how do you deal with the push-pull of being a brand & having to make money?

SB: That's tricky. & I think that's why metamorphosis was such a good mantra for not only this collection but also just how I feel in the moment. I've intentionally made decisions about the brand so that it can shapeshift & I can sell whatever I want. I've sold paintings before. I've sold garments. &, overall, I'm really interested in seeing where my creativity goes into things that people are willing to buy. So that's part of it. I'm kinda just putting things out there to see if people will buy them because you never know. But, you know, we were talking a little bit earlier about the balance between labor & expression. There are some things that I feel like I'm creating from a vision or maybe a dream or subconsciously consuming a lot of ideas versus something that I think will sell. But, the two merge & everything ends up falling on a spectrum of ‘strategic planning’ & ‘expression’.

JW: Seeing as we're on the topic of consumer culture, I want to revert back to your blog. You made a post in January, where you talked about the landscape of consumer activism & how there's this dichotomy between what the market wants, which is the constant state of lack & perpetual desire versus the atypical consumer who's satisfied & likes how they look, especially on social media. In what ways does Pebble Studio embrace the atypical consumer while still abiding by consumer culture?

SB: I was talking with one of my really good friends yesterday about consumerism. & I love fashion. I love putting together garments & accessories & matching colors & embodying different personas. It's a performance. There's the cliche that every day the world is my runway. But, I mean, it is, right? I go to the gas station & I want to be seen as a certain type of person. So, that's one side of the coin where I'm buying things because it feels cool. But, also, I want to make people feel good in the same way that I feel when I buy something new. So, the other side of the coin is the one-off things that I make, which are a lot more time-consuming & thoughtful because I'm actually collecting vintage silver & melting it down. It's slow fashion & I think people can really see that. I'm selling to some people who may just love shopping, but also to people who are trying to be more conscious. & I think that storytelling does come across & people can feel it when they hold my stuff up.

JW: What's your process like? Not too long ago, we talked about process & you said something that was super interesting about how you actually need time to do nothing & that's how you come up with your best ideas.

SB: Yeah! I try not to force myself. There's a balance between forcing myself to do the labor & forcing myself to sit down & write ideas. I have a couple of sketchbooks just laying around. So, maybe I'll doodle something subconsciously for a few weeks, & then two months later I'll be in the studio & I'll say, okay, I've set aside 5 hours to make things, what am I going to make today? & then it'll just come out because I've been doodling it basically. There are also cycles to creativity where you're consuming ideas & then you're integrating them, & then you're releasing them. So, I'll be on Pinterest. I'll be on Instagram. I'll be saving things. Sometimes I'll even find an artist I like or a style & I'll stalk it. That's what consuming looks like for me. The integration stage is also really important, like taking walks, gardening, talking with people & just not thinking about it. For me, what comes first is a lot of little ideas & they're really small, not even the full piece. Eventually, I'll have like 50 ideas in my head & I'm constantly trying to integrate those things. So, when I do have creative time, I can just pull from my brain.

JW: When do you know an idea is finished?

SB: Shit. That's a good question. Sometimes I don't & I just have to put it out there before it's finished. I think a lot of people are scared to put their creative projects online. I think they're really scared of feedback & I think you'll never truly be 'finished' with stuff. & that's what's exciting about [Pebble Studio] being almost like a blog-like format. I know I have a blog, but, I also use Pebble Studio's page as a blog because it's like a work in progress. It's always changing. The pitfall is that if you feel really finished with a project & then you put it out there, you don't ever know how it's going to be received. We've talked about this before with projects that may feel like one's best work but don't necessarily get received the best on social media. So, you can't take it that seriously. Sometimes you just need to share it.

JW: As a final question, what would you say to people, reading this, who are looking to start a brand or simply embrace any art projects that they want to get off the ground?

SB: Share yourself, authentically. It might take a minute, but you're going to find people & people are going to find you that want to see that & want to hear it. When you're sharing what you think people might like, or you're sharing what you think is going to do well, the people that you attract are going to be attracted to only that. It's essential to put forward what you truly believe in. Share what you want to share & what you're excited about. I know some people just get lucky & their stuff goes viral, but that's not the case for most people & that shouldn't be a reason for it not to be shared. So, even if you get five likes & it's something that you're really proud of, maybe those people really looked at it & really felt it, you know? You shouldn't be afraid. You have to start somewhere. So, you might as well start today.

JW: Pebble Studio ~ the brand that touches people. Love it.

Pebble Studio will join Respire Clothing in the May’s Place studio for a pop-up Thursday August 18th from 5pm-8pm. Pizza and Beer on hand while supplies last.