Mélange Travel & Lifestyle Magazine April 2018 | Page 605

Zdenka Kiric
Jewelry Designer. St. Maarten.
Zdenka was born and raised in Croatia
(formerly socialist Yugoslavia). In their socialist
system, art school was not an option for her
parents, so after high school she studied
economics for two years, then technology
and shoe design for another two years with
the hope that one day she would work in art/
design environment.
promenade bench of many cities around
Europe, selling them to people as they passed
by. She even sold bikes to the Velorama Bike
museum in the Netherlands.
She grew up using her hands - sewing,
growing vegetables, cooking, making home-
made pasta, bread, jam and other practical
things. At twelve years old, Zdenka made her
first jewelry collection from self-drying clay,
which her parents sold to ladies at their work
place. In 1995 Zdenka discovered sailing and with
her 28 foot boat, crossed the Atlantic to the
Caribbean and arrived in Sint Maarten on
September 5th the same year the island was
hit by Hurricane Luis. It was also her birthday!
She lost her boat and everything she had. The
only thing she was able to save was wire. In
Zdenka’s mind, this was an omen – she was
meant to stay and she did. Since then, she
jokingly says she was shipwrecked on Sint
Maarten.
As a child, Zdenka travelled around Europe
getting the taste of a "different kind of
world" and in 1989, she set out on an
adventure to cycle through Western Europe,
making miniature wire aluminum bikes
and motorbikes to sell as a means of living.
She crafted the bikes while sitting on the In her early years on the island, Zdenka
worked on local charter boats, managed to
complete her captain license for small boats
and in 2003 started her own company, The
Art Box whose mission is to develop craft
products that will be made by local single
mothers with the intention of employing,