Silver/Blue Centaurea Flower Sculpture

My name's Alek Kocevski, I'm the artist and visionary behind Golden Butterfly Studios - local to Greenville, South Carolina, we're the only business in the United States that focuses on the production and distribution of handmade silk filigree decor and luxury art gifts. Being originally from Macedonia, silk filigree art is a very common, traditional technique, in the country and where I was mentored to do this work. In June of 2021, I officially ventured with my mentor overseas, trained a team, and established my business, Golden Butterfly Studios, with the intention of preserving and bringing a traditional art-form common to Europe and making it also popular here in the United States, where I've lived for close to 20 years. What inspired me to pursue a career in filigree was the tradition (which dates to 3000 B.C) and also the elegance behind the craft. When people hear the word "filigree", many assume the old technique which requires the manipulation of metal wires to create a motif. However, silk filigree can be considered as the new and more cost affordable alternative to wire filigree, but it brings out so many new advantages compared the old wire method. For that reason, I was predisposed on implementing this silk method and technique in my company's filigree designs. The technique of silk filigree has a lot of beneficial factors to it compared to wire filigree, both for the manufacturers and for the end customer, including - labor time, cost of overall materials, durability, unlimited design opportunities, and overall cost to end consumer. In regards to labor time, with the implementation of silk rather than wires, you can reduce the labor time from days/months to create a single piece all the way down to a few hours to a couple of days. Since using silk compared to metal wires, I also offer a vast majority of customers something that they can afford as a result. Plus, silk is a material that will not tarnish compared to metals. Overall, the mission of my art/decor business is that we’re trying to eliminate the continuous issue that people face in having to spend so much time and effort trying to find where to turn to in regards to finding exceptionally beautiful, high quality art pieces, at relatively affordable price.