How I’m Making It: Jenevieve Woon of Jenevieve Studio on her ceramic calling

What began as a form of self‑expression soon took on a life of its own. As people re‑evaluated their living spaces and what brought them comfort, Woon did the same. Encouraged by friends, she launched Jenevieve Studio, dedicated to ceramics, in 2021. “It was the perfect time to think about what I wanted at home, what my friends and family wanted, and what I could make for them,” she says.

Her focus on home goods also comes from a personal place. “The home space hasn’t always felt stable [or safe] for me,” she lets on. “[That] made me [gravitate towards] creating things for the home.” This creative rediscovery also stirred a long‑held desire to return to Singapore for good. As the brand gained traction, the idea of building something lasting began to feel within reach.

Today, Jenevieve Studio is a full‑fledged design practice spanning sculptural collections such as the Crema range of fluid, undulating forms, and the produce‑inspired Snacks series. Though distinct in tone and technique, both reflect Woon’s material‑first philosophy and instinctive approach to form. Her work resists easy categorisation, as “it’s less about a specific aesthetic and more about how I think through making something”, she shares. Each collection begins not with a mood board or reference image, but with how a material surprises and behaves in her hands. “That,” she says, “is what shapes the visuals in the end.”

The Crema collection emerged by accident. While experimenting with flat slabs of clay—typically used to create straight, structured forms—Woon dropped one, which folded into a curving, organic shape that reminded her of plant growth. This laid the foundation for her ethos around hand‑building. “No two hand‑built pieces are the same,” she explains. “I could technically try to make the same curves on a computer, but the little details of organic forms are special and you can only get them by hand.”

To transform those forms into usable, repeatable designs, she experimented with both traditional and digital mould‑making techniques that would allow her to preserve the subtle textures and irregularities of the original forms. The Snacks collection, on the other hand, had a more technical origin. It started with a slip casting class, an introduction to the centuries‑old ceramic‑making technique whereby liquid clay (or slip) is poured into a porous plaster mould that gradually draws out moisture from it, leaving behind a solid object that takes the shape of the mould. The process, Woon recalls, reshaped the way she thought about form and function. “When you’re making a mould of a hard object, if the seam line is too far, your object gets stuck,” she explains. 

To avoid this, students were encouraged to work with soft forms instead. Her professor introduced fruits and vegetables, unconventional choices in ceramics precisely because of their irregularities. Woon was immediately drawn to them. “They became these cool modules to build more shapes with,” she says. The Snacks collection from Jenevieve Studio emerged from this exploration, transforming familiar produce into vibrant, functional pieces designed for everyday rituals.

Woon’s material‑led ethos beyond ceramics has birthed various collaborations that explore the intersection of process, material and thoughtful living. These include working with wellness brand Moom Health on a limited‑edition Bloom cup, and partnering with botanical studio This Humid House on floral styling workshops.

As Woon’s work at Jenevieve Studio finds a wider audience, so, too, does a familiar reality: the persistent undervaluing of hand‑made craft in an age of mass production. “I’ve had shoppers come up to me at pop‑ups and ask why they should buy something hand‑made when they can get something similar on [Chinese e‑commerce platform] Taobao for a fraction of the price,” she says.

“What I tell them is that when you buy something from Taobao … most of the time, it’s either a generic template or, if it’s more interesting, something copied from someone else. That’s why it can be priced so low.” She shares that in contrast, her work, like that of many independent makers, involves hours of research, sketching and experimentation. “It takes a long time to build a collection with forms we truly believe in,” she states.

Woon urges people to look deeper. “We’re often drawn to things that feel special because it reminds us a human made it,” she suggests. “You can sense the time and effort behind the design. If you have the resources to support artists in creating those moments of joy, [do so because that] helps us keep making the things that make your home a place you want to go back to.

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