From visionaries to venture-backed, BTB’s series goes inside the minds shaping tomorrow’s economy. We speak to the founders, funders, and trailblazers reimagining value, not just through balance sheets, but cultural influence. What drives them? What are their insights on key industry trends? And what separates conviction from noise? Find out below.
Before Steff Eleoff’s liquid metal sculptures adorned the likes of Kylie Jenner, KPop sensation CL, and Olivia Rodrigo, she was a fine arts student in New York wrestling with the chasm between institutional orthodoxy and creative impulse. What began as pandemic restlessness—scouring Toronto thrift stores for forgotten brooches—has matured into one of Canada’s most distinctive jewellery practices, worn by global cultural tastemakers and discerning collectors alike. Today, she’s recognised not only for sculptural forms that dissolve the boundary between adornment and sculpture, but for architecting a practice anchored in radical transparency, ecological responsibility, and what she terms “the art of play.” Her 2024 Emerging Accessory Designer win at the Canadian Arts & Fashion Awards affirmed what the industry had already sensed: Eleoff represents a generational recalibration of what jewellery can mean.
Speaking on Beyond the Boardroom’s Founders & Funders, Eleoff articulates the conviction that’s propelled her trajectory from dropout to cultural disruptor. “I didn’t start with a plan to launch a brand. I just followed what felt natural,” she says. Whilst her peers labour over demographic targeting and competitive matrices, Eleoff has pursued an altogether different methodology. “If something is calling to you, you should go towards it. Honestly, if I had known how hard it was going to be, maybe I would’ve hesitated. But being a bit naïve helped me, because I didn’t have those mental blocks of ‘I can’t do this.'” That instinctive discipline has become her defining characteristic, an unwavering refusal to subordinate intuition to industry convention.
The conversation unpacks what renders her aesthetic so uniquely resonant within a busy marketplace. Eleoff is forthright about the structural challenge. “I think every industry is considered saturated, but I never let that stop me,” she says. For her, the solution isn’t manufactured differentiation, it’s epistemic authenticity. “Nobody has your point of view, so if you create from that, you’ll stand out.” That perspectival singularity was forged across years immersed in fine arts—sculpture, painting, large-scale installation. After pursuing an MFA in New York centred on sculptural practice and art historical inquiry, she withdrew when the programme failed to sustain her creative appetite, returning to Toronto where she serendipitously encountered silversmithing. Three months at Artscape Daniels Launchpad constituted her entire formal training. Everything else she cultivated through practice.
Her grandmother’s presence suffuses the work, operating simultaneously as aesthetic inheritance and emotional substrate. “After she passed, I inherited her incredible costume jewellery collection,” Eleoff shares. Rather than preserve the pieces as archival objects, she metabolised them. “I reinterpreted some of her shapes into new designs, like our ‘drip locket,’ a modern take on the classic locket. It’s both a tribute to her and a way of creating new memories.” For Eleoff, jewellery transcends ornamentation, it functions as repository for identity, lineage, and collective memory. This affective dimension transcends base metal into cultural text, which explains why her clientele describe the pieces as talismanic, confidence-conferring armour.
Eleoff is equally resolute about sustainability as foundational infrastructure rather than peripheral concern. “If I’m drawing inspiration from nature, I want to protect it too,” she says. The studio operates exclusively with reclaimed metals and maintains a made-to-order production philosophy, guaranteeing zero waste. “If a piece doesn’t make it into production, we melt it down and reuse it. That way we’re not adding to the problem of overproduction and landfill waste.” The brand recently introduced in-house gold vermeil, democratising access to precious metal designs whilst retaining absolute control over environmental and qualitative integrity. Transparency, she maintains, isn’t strategy, it’s structural. “I share our process openly, even the messy parts.”
Looking forward, Eleoff envisions expansion, though never at craft’s expense. Asked where she’d stage her next immersive intervention, her response is unequivocal: Asia. “I visited Tokyo and was floored by the beauty, intentionality, and design everywhere. It was so clean, inspiring, and creative. I’d love to explore more of Asia, it’s on my bucket list to see as much as I can and absorb those cultural influences.”
What ultimately distinguishes Eleoff’s practice isn’t celebrity endorsement or sculptural virtuosity, it’s the philosophical architecture beneath. “Wearable art is about finding inspiration everywhere: art, nature, culture, and appreciating the small things around you,” she says. “For me, it could even be the view from a plane window. Translating those forms into jewellery is about sharing that perspective and inviting people to connect emotionally with the piece they wear.”
Watch the full conversation to see how Eleoff turned creative instinct into industry recognition, and why she believes the brands that endure are the ones that never mistake momentum for meaning.