Meet the makers in Elk Country

Our home here at the center of the PA Wilds lives up to its name. The Elk Country landscape is home to the largest free-roaming elk herd in the northeast. It’s not uncommon to find them grazing in our backyards. While some people are still discovering that Pennsylvania is home to elk, we’ve been stewarding them for decades and finding ways to celebrate their beauty and resilience. Now let’s meet the makers that call this part of the PA Wilds their home, and where they create their works of art!

Meet our first maker, Mickayla Poland of PA Made LLC.  In the heart of my being lies a profound connection to the outdoors, this is the driving force of everything she does with PA Made. Mickayla Poland, is an artist and entrepreneur located in Elk County. Born in the California desert to growing up in the lush landscapes of Pennsylvania, She discovered her love for nature in the PA Wilds. As she concluded my college years, a new chapter emerged. She embarked on a journey of sharing her signature wildlife paintings on glass windows. The spring of 2017 was pivotal when she showcased her art at the Ridgway Chainsaw Rendezvous. Observing larger cities like Pittsburgh celebrated through collectible stickers and t-shirts, she felt a calling to create her own place-based graphic designs in the heart of the PA Wilds. With this purpose, she founded PA Made, driven by her mission to showcase the unique beauty and charm of Pennsylvania and the PA Wilds through art and graphics. Beyond her artistic pursuits, she cherishes moments on the Clarion River, camping, and exploring the PA Wilds. In 2021, she earned the Champion of the Pennsylvania Wilds Great Design Award. Today, she is a Wilds Cooperative artist, Arts in Education teaching artist, and a proud member of the Keystone Elk Country Alliance. She spends her days running her retail store, The PA Made Shop, located in Weedville, PA. It is a unique gift shop featuring her unique apparel and art along with a variety of products crafted exclusively by local Pennsylvania artists and makers.

Next up is Sally Azzato of WC Blooms, she has been growing specialty cut flowers in her home gardens for years. She has gotten so much joy from hearing how much her flowers have reminded customers of wonderful memories from their past. Customers will pick up a bouquet at her roadside stand to make their homes feel more peaceful and put together. They may gift flowers to a friend who is ill, or going through a rough time. She am reminded of the healing power of flowers and am touched that her efforts in growing them can be a part of those journeys. For her customers who don't live close enough to pickup a bouquet, she am developing various resources teaching them how to grow and harvest from a small cutting garden, with creative ways to use the blooms once cut. "Sharing the joy of locally grown flowers through market bouquets and resources which encourage you to grow and create with blooms too!" says Azzato.

If you love reading books about true crime cases, then the books by James Baumgratz are right up your alley. He has written 6 books so far which focus on true cases of Murder & Mysterious Deaths from all corners of the Pennsylvania Wilds. His first book, Elk County Murders & Mysterious Deaths, Volume I, came out in 2018. He has since followed this book up with Volumes II and III of Elk County Murders and then wrote McKean County Murders & Mysterious Deaths Volume I.He has now been focused on the Pennsylvania Wilds with Volume I of Murders & Mysterious Deaths in the Pennsylvania Wilds being published at the end of 2021 and his latest edition, Missing in the Pennsylvania Wilds being published this past fall. He is presently working on Volume II of Murders & Mysterious Deaths in the Pennsylvania Wilds and has several other books in progress. "I am an author who explores the darker side of the Pennsylvania Wilds's history. " says Baumgratz.

Jessica from Fair Weather Trading Company creates lovely tallow soaps and lotions, her motto is, "Tallow based products for a tallow based lifestyle!". She has lived in Chester County for most of her life and has made amazing connections with the community she is surrounded by. She and her husband chose to take a completely different road in life and move to Ridgway for the opportunity to spread out and start enjoying a simpler life. She still works with the farmer in Chester County who has a small farm raising American Wagyu. She gets the suet and fat and renders it down into tallow and from there, her products can be created. She loves every step of the process and getting to share all of the benefits that tallow has to offer.

If you love a good sauce, dressing, or marinade, Melanie and Clay from Village Eatinghouse make some of the best. Many - like 30+ years ago, Clay opened his first restaurant in Historic Boalsburg, Pa and he needed a house dressing... Enter, their most popular sauce; Sweet & Sour Italian. He used it for salads, for marinating chicken, for making pasta salad and so much more, Folks loved it and started asking to take it home - Thus - bottling his sauce became second nature. He continued to formulate new sauces and started offering them at festivals & fairs and to local Mom & Pop stores in the area. Soon, and for the past 20 years, more and more folks have been able to enjoy eating simply at home, thanks to great tasting versatile and "clean" sauces.

"Jewelry fresh off the bench in the PA Wilds " is the motto of Stephanic Distler, of Stephanie Distler Studios.  She is an autodidact or self taught. She describes herself  as an artisan coming from PA Wilds Roots with Rural Organic style. The working studio is housed in her home and focuses on ‘made by these hands’ designs, inspired by nature  These pieces carry with them a sense of place. digging in the garden, hiking in the PA Wilds, shopping for fresh produce at the local farmers’ market, enjoying an IPA at a craft brewery or antiquing on Main Street.  These designs are reminders of our downtime.

Coming from a family of ‘makers’ including woodworkers, fiber artisans, cooks, and gardeners, she has chosen precious metals over wood shavings. The working studio allows for metalwork, mixed media, fiber art, displays, workshops, PA Wilds events, and other artistic endeavors.

"Over the years my jewelry and mixed media techniques have continually drawn inspiration from those rural traditions that were once everyday life for our ancestors. A more tactile life or being a part of the process of just living, has become a need in this age of technology for me and so many others. The act of making with our hands utilitarian wares or more refined artistic works, from beginning to end, has become a way of living." says Distler.