Tucked away in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley of central Virginia, with the Blue Ridge Mountains as a background, Karis tends her flower gardens, creates her unique pottery, and generally enjoys life doing what she loves.

          When making my pottery, my goals are to make something useful and to give visual pleasure. And while I'm doing this I want to have fun. When someone who sees my pottery says "these make me smile" - I know I've reached my goal.
          My work has been influenced by living and traveling in Southeast Asia and Europe. But it is also influenced by my Norwegian ancestry, which give me an affinity for the clean Scandinavian sense of design in regard to form as well as the Norwegian regard for nature.
          Over the past 20 odd years, I've been drawn to many objects in the natural world - leaves, flowers, vegetables - but animals have been the most fun and give me the most challenge. My goal is not to create a photographic image, but to capture the essence of the animal. Elephants are wrinkly. Giraffes are bumpy. Hippos are silly.
          And sometimes, my animals do the unexpected - like reach inside your bowl to try and eat before you do...