The Auroras started out as normal pendants, just with the idea to burn images of the Northern Lights. Living in Finland and seeing the Auroras dance in the night sky, inspired me; I really wanted to capture that magic into a pendant.

But burning a static image into a piece of wood, lacked that special, flowing motion of what makes the Northern Lights so magical.

Then I noticed some woods have a natural shimmer to them. When you turn this particular wood to the light, that shimmer glows and seems to move, similar to how the Northern Lights move! And I knew I had discovered something cool!

This “special” wood is burl wood. (A burl or burr is a tree growth in which the grain has grown in a deformed manner. It is commonly found in the form of a rounded outgrowth on a tree trunk or branch that is filled with small knots from dormant buds – Wikipedia). And this shimmer, is called chatoyance.

In the photo below, you can you see the lighter, glowing parts of the large birch burl I was gifted. Depending how the light catches this wood, in my eyes it looks exactly like how the Northern Lights dance in the night sky!

If you’d like to see an example, check out this Instagram post. Or this other Instagram post, where you clearly see this chatoyance in the burl wood. 

The coolest thing about the Aurora pendants, I think, is the fact that the shimmer in the burl wood is as unique as the Aurora Borealis is in real. The wood dictates what the Aurora pendant will look like. Even if I wanted to, I could not make two identical pendants. As an artist, it’s a joy to let this burl wood speak to me like that!

Therefore, the Auroras are made as series of pendants, not as custom orders. Visit the store to see if there are currently any for sale!