SHARED SPACES: Ekaterina Harman from Nako Brooklyn

 

Ekaterina, Ceramicist, Designer, and Coffee Shop Owner.

Shared Spaces is a conversation series featuring the people that shape the world around Maslo Jewelry.

Each interview offers a look inside the places they inhabit, the objects they return to, and the stories that connect us.

Ekaterina moves fluidly between ceramics, clothing, and the coffee shop she owns and creatively directs. Across each, she embraces comfort, warmth, and the beauty of imperfection, values that also shape Maslo’s approach to jewelry and the objects we choose to live with.

 

Tell us about the space you're in today. 

Today I am at my favorite place Nako Brooklyn, where I can enjoy warm conversations, sip my favorite cup of coffee and do my job.

 

When people walk into your coffee shop, what do you hope they feel before they even order?

When we have a first time visitor, I want them to feel the calm, the warm light, the coziness of the moment. I want them to slow down and take a moment to themselves in that beautiful and fast city of New York.

 

People often expect perfection from jewelry, but we can still appreciate the unique details in materials like freshwater pearls or vintage components. Do you prefer objects that feel perfectly finished, or ones that still show the hand that made them? 

I always loved and preferred textures in any kind of objects or fashion. That’s my thing. While I sew clothes, I will go for a textured fabric or create it myself. If I do pottery I prefer it raw and not perfectly shaped, If I draw I will use a textured paper or if it’s a canvas I will use acrylic paint to create that texture, so when sunlight falls in, there is a shadow play. I love perfect imperfection details which brings me warmth.

 

What do you hope someone feels the first time they experience one of your designs?

I want that person to feel comfortable and self confident if it’s a clothing piece. If that’s a pottery, I want that person to feel the warmth of the object and stay in the moment.

 

Is there a common thread that ties everything you make together?

Yes, there is. I always pursue the idea of a piece of mind and comfort when I create any of my designs.

 

Some objects become more meaningful through use rather than preservation. Does jewelry feel more like pottery or fashion to you in that way?

Jewelry is a very special item for me, it is always has a meaning. If I get it from someone special to me, or I buy it because I made an achievement, it creates a memory. 

It is something between pottery and fashion and it has it’s own special place.

 

You're surrounded by so many beautiful materials, clay, fabric, coffee. Is there one you feel most connected to, and why?

I feel the most connected to fabric and pottery because my mom is a tailor and all my childhood I spent with sewing machine sounds around me. I started to explore this craftsmanship when I was 8 years old. On free days I would do a pottery next to my mom, while she was sewing her projects. So both of those craftsmanships has a very special attachment for me. 

Coffee has a very special meaning for me as well. That’s something my husband and I created together. That is one of the things we share together, love for coffee.

 

Is there a piece of jewelry you wear almost every day? What makes it the one you continually return to?

Yes, I never leave the house without my watch.

Is there a jewelry material you're endlessly drawn to?

Right now I can’t see myself without silver jewelry.