For some folks, commuting means living in Eureka and working in Arcata. For others, it means living in Fortuna and working in Trinidad. Either way, the way we perceive commuting has changed in the wake of remote work and, in some ways, so has the idea of having a brick-and-mortar business.

Leonardo Dormayr, 28, on a typical day wakes up at 9 a.m., pours his coffee and powers up for his commute, eight feet underground.

That is to say, he works in his basement for his company, Dormayr Designs. He makes jewelry from scratch. In every piece he creates, every material, except for the gemstones, is hand-made. The designs, the metals, the wires — all of it.

It all starts on his iPad, where he draws his designs using the Procreate drawing application.

Currently, Dormayr has created enough drawings over the years that he can now scroll through his designs and pick out what he wants to work on for the day.

All the equipment necessary took Dormayr roughly a decade to collect, and it allows him to plan and create jewelry daily. He often creates necklaces, pendants and rings. He categorizes his work in two types: one-of-a-kind pieces and production pieces.

One-of-a-kind pieces take significantly longer to plan and create. One piece took him roughly 24 hours over the course of three days from start to finish. He spent the first five hours or so on just the planning process, which includes figuring out what gemstones he wants to use, the dimensions of the piece and choosing the types of metals for the piece. A hand-crafted piece like this can sell for upwards of $2,500.

A production piece is significantly more affordable. With production pieces, Dormayr can spend a couple hours planning it out and then spend the majority of a week creating multiples of that piece. The amount of time and precious material he uses is different than a one-of-a-kind piece, but the quality does not change.

Dormayr’s process starts with each centerstone: He takes their characteristics and creates a design for the metal surrounding it, seemingly out of thin air. His process is basically unfettered creativity, and it is called Hand Fabrication.

“Gemstones are generally cut the same — you have your rounds, your rectangles, your squares and tear drops,” Dormayr says. “Yet every jeweler has a creative thought process that they apply, and everything will end up unique.”

Dormayr will take his design and draw it onto a sheet of silver or gold, which he melts down and makes himself, and he takes a tiny hand saw to cut each component out in layers. Then he cuts another sheet and begins soldering it on top of the first layer. He repeats the process until his design is fully realized.

In other words, each piece is made up of stacked metal sheets, soldered together, and then filed down to the final shape, not unlike a 3-D printed object. Once all that is done, Dormayr will hand-polish the metals and then drill out the cavities for where he will place the stones. In the final step, he uses a gold wire that hugs the center stone and is then soldered into the metal housing. To add a little extra flair, he will also engrave some of his pieces to make them just a little more unique than they already are.

Dormayr sources all of his gems from people he has met going to gem shows over the years. Most of them he buys at the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show. It is said to be the largest, oldest and most prestigious gem and mineral show in the world.

“You meet people who mine the stones themselves. They get someone to cut the stones and then they take the stones to gem shows to sell,” Dormayr says. “I’ve talked with people from Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, China, Brazil, you name it.”

Originally from Munich, Germany, Dormayr and his family moved to the United States when he was 10 years old. His mom had a job offer in Los Angeles, and they took the opportunity. Dormayr grew up in the San Fernando Valley, and after high school worked in restaurants, bars, and other service gigs.

At one point, Dormayr found himself talking with people selling jewelry at music festivals and he began to show interest in wire wrapping. It started as a hobby but his interest quickly shifted toward other kinds of jewelry. Then in 2015, seeing other people’s work in the hand-made jewelry space online inspired him to take a course with the Gem and Mineral Society in Oxnard.

“Me and my friend were the only young guys in this class of older ladies picking up this jewelry style,” Dormayr said. “It was three hours a day, one day a week, for a couple of weeks or so. The jewelry was simple… I wanted to learn more intricate things.”

He then took to online resources like YouTube and Instagram. Other artists tend to show their process online and Dormayr took this to his advantage by applying what he saw in his own work. In some ways, he had lots of formal and informal teachers in this trade. He also took a one-week course in stone setting in Tennessee.

In 2021, Dormayr decided to move to Humboldt County to escape the city and found work in the cannabis industry. He continued to make jewelry on his own time, and when people showed interest in his creations he thought maybe he could sell a couple on the side for a little extra cash. Then his job quickly became unstable as the cannabis industry suffered and he decided to dive into jewelry full-time.

“I started to think, should I find another job? Or maybe I could work from home and sustain my living with my art,” Dormayr said. “I figured I didn’t want to worry about losing my job. Now it’s all on me. I’m my own boss.”

Dormayr’s early successes came from selling his work at music festivals. With some trial and error, he can now strategically choose which festivals to attend that are more likely to have people who will buy his pieces. Other than that, he primarily sells jewelry online through his Instagram account, his website, and smaller markets local and non-local.

Looking ahead, Dormayr is partnering with Aaron Brooks, Long Island Glass, and Jerry Kelly this September to participate in the “Finally… It’s a Fucking Art Show” in Holtsville, NY. He is planning to continue his tradition of selling at music festivals, and hopes to take more jewelry making courses to widen and perfect his already impressive skill set.