Humans of St. Norbert:

“String Works is basically me making string art and selling it to people. It started out my junior year of high school. I always looked on Pinterest for stuff to do and I tried it, and I really liked it, so I continued doing it. My skills got better and better the more I did it. My cousin’s wife owned a gift shop in town where other vendors could sell stuff and she asked me if I wanted to do that. I said, yes. When she closed the shop, I had already started my Facebook page, which was to reach out to the community. It’s obviously expanded since then.

“I figure out what size or shape the board my customers would want. Then, I prep the board by cutting, staining and painting it. Then, I print out a template of a picture or words, size it up to the board, tape it down, mark with a pen where I want to nail it and then I just nail them to the spot. Next, I string the pattern.

“It’s not a lot, but it’s helping me pay for my schooling. It’s a lot harder to do here. I obviously don’t want to hammer the nails in when my roommates are home because it’s just distracting. So, I usually go home to do that part and then I bring it here to string when I have time.

“It is harder running my business now that I’m in college. At the same time it’s become a little bit easier because my knowledge has grown just from taking classes here. My marketing and accounting class both just help organize me. But time-wise, it’s definitely harder.”
– Jessica Ney ‘22