Stone, Iron, and the High Garden
A working shop in the Rio Grande watershed, where hand-cut letters and forged glasswork help keep this ditch, this land, and its water in care.
David Kirkland — Founder, Ecclesia-Terra
David Kirkland is a U.S. Army veteran and former helicopter crew chief who flew two combat tours in Afghanistan and Iraq, earning the Air Medal with Valor. He founded Ecclesia-Terra, a regenerative land-and-water effort in the Rio Grande watershed of northern New Mexico, joining acequia stewardship, arroyo and spring restoration, and syntropic agroforestry. His longer vision — The High Garden — treats the repair of land and the recovery of people as a single act.
Nicolae Vasiu — NV Art Creations
Nicolae Vasiu is a self-taught glass artist and master blacksmith who has fused hand-forged iron with glass for more than 40 years. Born in Transylvania, Romania, he immigrated to New York, where the reverse-paint glass artist Ulla Darni inspired him to work in that medium. He moved to the Santa Fe area in 2003. His chandeliers — geometric, abstract, and floral — anchor a body of work that also includes sconces, lamps, fountains, functional metal art, and abstract epoxy paintings. Frustrated by unreliable suppliers, he built his own kiln to slump his own glass, and now does it all himself: molds, glass, and metalwork.