Nestled along the back roads of Athens in an old produce warehouse, Rebecca Wood and her 12 artists are busy creating beauty.

They design and create their ceramic dinnerware line from Georgia red clay and decorate them in peaceful botanical designs and luscious colors.

When she was young, Wood said she first wanted to be a weather girl, then an archeologist and finally settled on being an artist.

She graduated from the University in 1977 with a degree in drawing and painting.

“I guess I was always an artist at heart,” Wood said. “I played by myself a lot so I would use my imagination all the time. From that, it just grew.”

After graduation, Wood spent 10 years selling her paintings.

In 1987, however, there was a stock market crash.

“Nobody wanted to spend any money anymore, so I thought I better start doing something that didn’t cost as much as painting,” Wood said.

From there, Wood delved into designing and selling jewelry, clothing and fabrics. She even learned china painting.

“China painting is where you go buy some china at Pier 1 that’s already white, then you paint it with all these delicate little paints,” she said. “It’s very labor intensive and not permanent – it comes off in the dishwasher.”

Looking to create more permanent forms of art, Wood began to explore ceramics.

“I never dreamed I’d have been doing ceramics for 17 years,” she said. “I never originally liked ceramics. But once I started making them, I started liking them.”

Wood originally started R. Wood Studio in Lexington in 1991.

She sold fabric painting, sewing, jewelry and did only a little ceramics.

Gradually, all anyone ever wanted to order were the ceramics, so she dropped her other projects and started making ceramics full time.

The studio moved to its current location on Georgia Drive off Oconee Street in Athens in 1992.

Wood hopes to one day retire to a little farm somewhere, grow her own food and make homemade wine and pottery.

In between now and then, she said she hopes to spread the word about beauty.

The R. Wood Studio line is sold in almost every ceramics store in Athens and throughout the country as well.

The one-of-a-kind pieces are also sold online. Visit rwoodstudio.com for more information.