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Member Spotlight: Patricia Aycock Mertz

Even in her hippie/flowerchild days when she went without makeup and a bra, Patricia Aycock Mertz always had earrings on. This love of earrings led her to set up in e-commerce business: Aycock Mertz Limited—Exquisite Earrings in February 2000. Clients from all over the globe visit her site to purchase her earrings online. Patricia designs and hand-assembles earrings made of artisan-crafted sterling silver beads from Bali, Swarovski crystals, and colorful semi-precious stones from around the world. At the moment, her company is strictly earrings, but she notes, "I am planning on branching out and adding other items."

Patricia has always had an artistic flair. She learned about semi-precious stones when working in the Anschel Gallery on London's famous King's Road in Chelsea. While the gallery sold contemporary limited-edition graphics by many of the top POP artists of the day, it also featured beautiful hand-crafted jewelry made by the top designers in Britain.

After taking a bead-stringing course at G Street Fabrics, Patricia designed earrings as gifts for family and friends, and then started donating them to fundraisers. One of her designs was selected as one of the best 20 products from the state of Maryland for QVC's "Quest For The Best Tour" trade show in 1997.

Her husband, who is also her business partner in his spare time, developed a catalog of photos and descriptions of her earrings, and they decided to put them up on the web. Within a few months, Aycock Mertz Limited—Exquisite Earrings was selected to appear in an article in Victoria Magazine about companies that had moved their businesses online. The company was also featured in the special Victoria Entrepreneurs August 2000 edition and I-Village's Momprenuers Online. Patricia's success led her to recently appear on a panel, “How To Start Your Own Business,” for the Women' s Center in Virginia.

After getting her own site up and running, she and her husband created a website for her mother's gourmet food company, The Larder of Lady Bustle, Ltd., found on the webs at www.larderofladybustleltd.com. This is a site for the best lemon curd and other delicious items.

DCWW member Patricia Aycock Mertz has had a varied career. She worked in trendy fashion boutiques in London, managed a London art gallery, tutored English in Paris, was a property manager in Atlanta, a realtor in Washington, worked in a flower shop, ran an antiques booth in Kensington, catered a wedding and appeared in a play at The Source Theater's 10 minute play competition. She has also taught at a Montessori pre-school in Atlanta and was an instructional assistant in an elementary school.

While she claims to have not been a good student, Patricia is a life-long learner. She started out in Morris public school in Atlanta, Georgia; attended Wembley Independent Grammar School in London; Aida Foster School of Dramatic Arts; and College du Leman outside Geneva, Switzerland; attended Cranborne Chase School for Girls in Wardour Castle (the one that was featured in the film Billy Elliot) in Tisbury, Wiltshire; and Oglethorpe College (now university). She had also studied acting at Alliance Theater and cooking with Natalie Dupree, the Southern cookbook author. While tutoring in Paris, she studied French and the piano.

Although Patricia has lived in Europe, Washington is a special place for her. "I grew up spending holidays here staying with my mother's sister and her family as a child, so I almost feel like a native Washingtonian."

Patricia's far-flung adventures have given her a love of travel and she would like to some day expand Aycock Mertz to include luxury tours to London. When she does that, she can capitalize on her love of theater and movies, dancing, and antiquing .

Patricia and her husband have two sons and two dogs.

Particia has many sites in her bookmarks. For work she visits the following sites:

• Hint Magazine for all the sites listed on it.
  http://www.hintmag.com
• Look online
  http://www.lookonline.com/content2 .html
• Page Six
  http://www.pagesix.com/fashionbiz/fashionbiz.htm
• Vogue UK
  http://www.vogue.co.uk

Contributed by Gail Werner

Curious to see who our previous member spotlights were? Check out our archives!

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