Candida Spender-van Rood

(aka) Candy Spender is an artist and designer, who has been designing and making jewellery for over twenty five years in Melbourne, Australia.
Born in Venezuela in 1951, Candy’s early childhood years were powerfully influenced
by the mixture of cultures she grew up in. From Iran to Europe, and the Dutch West Indies, Candy’s family were ‘bohemian’, as they lived unconventionally and creatively,
within a myriad of cultures before migrating to Australia in the mid-sixties.

Candy is renowned for her original and creative jewellery design, her business Candy Spender Jewels has been around since the early 80’s. 
An artist and designer, her background is in painting, printmaking, and graphic design. (As a jeweller she is self-taught.) In 1973 She graduated from the South Australian School of Art, with a Diploma in Graphic Design. Then went on to do a postgraduate year of painting and printmaking at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam. (1973)

These days her studio is a place where the alchemy between art and fashion breathes with a costume-jewellery-for-Haute-Couture presence.
Cross-cultural traditions, and her background in painting, graphic design and astrology bring freedom and Spirit to her jewellery pieces. With an unorthodox approach she mixes semi-precious, vintage and contemporary crystal and glass stone and beads to produce inspirational and directional pieces.

Commissions, bespoke jewellery pieces and small seasonal ranges which,
interpret current moods in fashion and the zeitgeist, are exploratory and independent.

Candy Spender Jewels

At the forefront of Australian costume jewellery in the nineties, and often appearing in mainstream 'glossy' publications and media events Candy Spender jewellery still holds a place in the heart of many collectors of fine design. Stocked by over thirty stores in Australia,  International fashion houses such as Browns in London; several galleries in North America, as well as an exclusive fashion boutique in Hong Kong, Candy recently pared back the wholesale operation so as to be able to concentrate on one-of-a-kind jewellery commissions and painting.