For Steve and Kay Kennard, one of the most fulfilling chapters of their lives will forever be intertwined with one of the most difficult ones.
Their art company, Kennard’s Kreations, began with a gift Steve created to comfort Kay after a series of family losses.
The gift was a framed silhouette of a butterfly filled with strips of wood, antique pieces, and other repurposed materials. Forming the butterfly’s body is a piece of a broken rocking chair that once belonged to Kay’s late mother.
Not only did the butterfly become a cherished keepsake, but it also inspired a steady stream of compliments and requests for similar pieces, requests that led Steve and Kay to establish Kennard’s Kreations about three years ago.
Today the business fills orders for customers throughout the country. Steve still makes butterflies, but also a wide range of other silhouettes, from horses, dogs, and eagles to crosses and churches. Each piece is filled with layers of antique items, including sections of picture frames, wooden levels, rulers, and more.
“We have a motto that says we create fine art with purpose and soul,” Kay said. “The soul is in the antiques because they’re from a time that we both respect very much.”
As for the purpose aspect of their business, Kay said, it relates to broken and worn antiques that get new life in Steve’s art.
“We use pieces from croquet sets, and it brings back fond memories for people,” Kay said. “We use pieces from a washboard, and stories come out from that or old jewelry boxes or antique rulers. People are just very nostalgic about them.”
These days, most of the company’s orders and purchases take place at gift and art shows.
Not only can people see examples of Steve’s work, but they also meet him and Kay and hear the story behind Kennard’s Kreations.
A Season of Loss
It's a story with significant highs and lows. After Kay’s mother passed away, followed by her father, she began the painful task of clearing out her parents' home.
She pulled some things aside. A cedar chest. Her mother’s sewing machine and wedding dress.
“And then there was another thing I really wanted, her rocking chair, because she rocked us all, and she would sing a song to us, especially me, because I cried a lot when I was little, apparently, and that’s how she would put me to sleep,” Kay said.
Kay found the rocking chair in the attic, dusty and broken. She asked Steve if he could put it back together. He promised to try, but already he could tell that pieces and some of the chair’s hardware were missing.
“When pieces are so old like that, it’s hard to find replacements to fit exactly, the right color, the right shape and everything,” Kay said. “We started going to different antique shops to look for old rocking chairs like hers and see if we could put it back together.”
The search for the chair was an exercise in hope, and it did give Kay comfort. But then she lost another member of her close-knit family: her sister. To Kay, the series of losses seemed like a divine message, a calling to make some changes.
“I loved my job; I loved being an elementary school principal, and so I never thought of retiring. But when my sister died, I felt like that was God speaking to me. I needed to spend more time with my family.”
Kay shared her thoughts with Steve, who had recently completed a career in oil field inspection. Together, they worked out a plan: Kay would retire, and they would sell their suburban home north of Houston to move into their lake house with Steve’s parents, Michael and Elizabeth Kennard, who already lived with them.
“We would have a little bit more of a quiet life and figure out the rest from there,” Kay said.
Piecing Together a Family Story
After moving forward with their plans, Steve and Kay were able to spend more time with one another and with Steve’s parents. It was easier to make antique shop visits, too. They found a wealth of fascinating objects but never the pieces Steve needed to restore the broken rocking chair.
Over time, though, he started considering a different approach. What if he could transform the chair into a different kind of heirloom, something that still honored Kay’s mother, but also the family as a whole?
At that point, Steve enjoyed painting silhouettes, taking inspiration — at least in part — from two uncles, both talented artists. Eventually, he came up with the idea of cutting a wooden silhouette and filling it with pieces he and Kay had discovered during their antiquing expeditions. The final product included a piece of the broken rocking chair, part of an antique jewelry box Kay’s mother used, and an old folding ruler that had belonged to Kay’s dad.
The result was Kay’s butterfly. Not only did the pieces hold special meaning, but so did their colors.
“I felt like this was, again, God speaking to us,” Kay said. “Butterflies, especially yellow butterflies, signify my mom. When we all went back to see her after she passed away, a yellow butterfly flew across her grave.
“Our daughter-in-law was always giving me things with butterflies because of that. She had given me a yellow butterfly for my mom, a brown butterfly for my dad, and then a red and black one for my sister. She didn’t know this, but my sister was buried in my mom’s shawl that was red and black. That touched my heart.”
New Entrepreneurs: The Launch of Kennard's Kreations
And the butterfly touched those who saw it. Shortly after making it, Steve started getting requests for similar pieces, butterflies and other shapes. Before long, he and Kay realized they had a business opportunity and launched Kennard’s Kreations.
Running a business together has been a perfect fit, they say, because it allows them to spend time together doing something they both find meaningful.
The process of creating orders has some consistent steps: It usually begins with cutting a silhouette out of birch plywood, followed by sanding (handled by Kay), staining, and creating a frame to hold the silhouette and the elements that will be layered behind it. But the elements, and their colors and order, are never exactly the same.
Building those layers is the most challenging part of the process, Steve said.
“People think, oh, you just stack them to their limit,” he said. “Well, no, because they’re all different sizes. They’re all different shapes. You work with it and manage it, and sometimes it’s hard to do that.”
It’s hard but also fulfilling. The elements are how Steve personalizes pieces. They reflect the customer’s desires and his artistry.
One of the business’s more popular items, the cross, does have some standard elements that represent the crucifixion of Jesus Christ as recorded in the Bible. They include something with three dots in a row to represent nails, the number 33 to show the age of Christ when he was crucified, and colors with symbolic meanings. Earlier this year, Steve started displaying a written list of each symbol and its meaning on the back of the finished pieces.
Creating images with a cross or a church is particularly meaningful to Steve because, to him, it honors the strong faith of his mother, Elizabeth. He also loves creating eagles, which speak to his love of country.
Kay considers herself Steve’s assistant. In addition to sanding duties, she handles bookkeeping, provides input on arranging the elements, and continues helping Steve find interesting antiques to add to their stockpile. One of the couple’s favorite shared tasks is attending art and gift shows together.
“People buy things and come back and say, ‘I love this piece. I bought this one, and now I want this,’” Steve said. “It’s very satisfying.”
Steve and Kay also love the opportunities their business gives them to hear people’s stories, to hear why they want a particular silhouette or elements.
“We’re very faith oriented,” Steve said. “I always believe people come into your lives to inspire you to do something or give you direction. It’s been from our conversations with people that we’ve gone to the next step or tried something new.”
The Next Chapter
There have been other sources of inspiration and encouragement as well. After completing Kay’s butterfly, Steve continued making similar butterfly creations for customers, always with a piece of the rocking chair that belonged to Kay’s mother as the body. For Steve and Kay, it added special meaning to each of those creations, but eventually, they ran out of pieces of the chair.
Steve started planning to use a different style of chair spindles for the body.
“Around the time we were doing that, we went to a wedding, and we stopped in to one of the antique stores in the area,” Kay said. “There was this barrel, and it had those exact same (rocking chair) pieces. Mind you, we’ve been looking for those pieces forever and just happened to find them when we finished that last butterfly (with the last piece of the original rocker). We bought the whole barrel. So the butterflies have that same look; it’s just another chapter.”
For more information about Kennard’s Kreations, visit their company website or Facebook page.
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