Glass scraps clink and clank together as students rummage through boxes at the Wild Rose Glass studio on Harkers Island. They shuffle through pieces of iridescent greens and pearlescent pinks like shellers on the hunt for treasures washed ashore. The prismatic collection is just the beginning of the discoveries to be made in this stained-glass studio, a converted garage that sits just behind a massive live oak and sky-blue clapboard house filled with even more masterpieces.

Kate Keith, a second-generation glass artist, and her husband, Chris Choyce, lead tonight’s class along with Grae, Kate’s 13-year-old daughter and Wild Rose intern. Grae’s little sister, Marigold, observes but doesn’t help much. At the time of the class, she’s 5 months old and the only family member who isn’t proficient in the craft — yet. Kate’s parents, cofounders of Wild Rose, Richard and Beth Keith, were here earlier to chat with the guests, some of whom are neighbors and fellow artists. Everything at Wild Rose is a family affair.

Minnie, a community cat available for adoption, poses with the Keith family — (from left) Grae, Richard, Beth, Kate holding baby Marigold, and Chris Choyce — in front of Wild Rose Glass. photograph by Stacey Van Berkel

Once the group at tonight’s class has found the best pieces for their designs — fish, birds, boats, and the ever-popular Cape Lookout Lighthouse — Kate shows them to the light box. “Some glass transforms once you get it in the light [depending] on what time of day it is,” Chris says.

They arrange their pieces on the surface, and when Kate flips the switch, the glass changes before their eyes. Deep ocean blues soften to calm freshwater. Fiery oranges reveal streaks of rose. Opaque glass shows little, while translucent gives way to the light.

Over the course of the evening, Kate and Chris guide the class through cutting, grinding, foiling, soldering, and polishing glass until their collection of scraps melds into a beautiful suncatcher. But it won’t be until tomorrow, when the sun rises and fills their windows, that the students will experience the full beauty of their creations.

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Drive down Island Road on a clear afternoon, and you’ll eventually notice the sunlight begin to flicker. This historic section on the west end, known as Red Hill, harbors the oldest live oak trees and the few Spanish moss sightings on the island. Beneath a tangle of these time-weathered branches, the light catches a stained-glass panel planted in the grass — a houseless window, bearing the image of a woman named Rose. She is the siren of Wild Rose Glass, a figure that the family patriarch has been building into his work since long before he called this place home.

In the 1980s, Richard and Beth came across a stained-glass guidebook at a local antiques shop near their Randolph County home. Though Richard owned a hardware store in Ramseur and was not an artist by trade, he had worked with his hands his whole life and figured he could give this a go. They called the number on the back of the book and ordered $1,000 worth of glass. “They asked if I’d ever cut glass before, and I’d cut plenty of windowpane at the hardware store,” Richard says with the confidence of a man who’s never met a project he couldn’t complete with hard work.

Kate leads repeat students (from left) Suzie Lasure of Denver, Colorado, and Kate Judy Clark and Nanci Wren of Wilmington in making glass treasures during a girls’ trip for Suzie’s birthday. photograph by Stacey Van Berkel

The couple was excited about the new venture, but that call was a risk. Keith’s Hardware had been around since Richard’s father opened it in 1937, but business was slowing. Big-box hardware stores had moved in nearby, and Richard and Beth needed to find another revenue stream to support their three young children. “We never got into [stained glass] to get rich,” Richard says. “We needed to pay a light bill.”

They cleared a table in the back of the store and started making suncatchers and panels, which they’d hang in the storefront. Their first sale was a dogwood design for $15. Both Richard and Beth took to the art quickly; Beth had an eye for design and color, and Richard was a natural with any tool and became one of the few folks in the area who could do repairs. “Once it gets in your blood, you just wake up in the middle of the night and have a design right there in your head,” Beth says.

The name Wild Rose Glass was inspired by a sketch from their middle child, Amy, of a woman she called Rose that her father later brought to life in many of his creations.

“Everybody has a talent,” Beth Keith says. “You just got to home in on it.” photograph by Stacey Van Berkel

Soon, the couple became known for their art as much as their wares. You can still see plenty of their commissioned work and repairs in churches and homes across the Piedmont. Beth began teaching the art of stained glass at Randolph Community College, bringing along their youngest daughter, Kate, while Richard picked up plumbing work and other jobs.

“My parents are both children of farmers, salt-of-the-earth hard workers, and they’ve carried that mentality all their lives,” Kate says. “There were never too many hours of work to be done.”

In the 2000s, Wild Rose was successful enough to support the family, so the couple sold the hardware store. Amy and Kate went to college to study art and soon started families of their own. Beth and Richard moved to Harkers Island to care for her parents, who had retired there.

The next generation helped carry on Wild Rose during this time. Kate, who also moved Down East in 2020, continued to make pieces for art shows and commissions, and Richard taught Kate and Chris, a chef by trade, the painstaking process behind glass repairs. “You ever heard of Johnny Cash stealing one piece at a time to make a Cadillac?” Richard would ask Chris. “That’s how you have to do it. One piece at a time.”

Beyond the gallery, Wild Rose Glass doubles as an Airbnb. photograph by Stacey Van Berkel

After Beth’s parents died, Richard and Beth returned to their art and slowly transformed the Harkers Island property into a gallery of their life’s work. Nearly every window in the 1914 home features a Keith family original, some dating back decades. There are sunken ships behind couches and fiery florals in a bathroom. Whatever the summer sun touches here, the Keith family — and their students — have reimagined it in glass.

After 15 years, the family has made Harkers Island home, contributing to a legacy of Down East artists inspired by and striving to immortalize the beauty around them. The transplants have been welcomed by their native neighbors, who’ve shared the long history and traditions that define the Keiths’ adopted home. “We’re just happy to be here,” Kate says.

They’ve become a part of this island the same way their art has become part of every church, home, and window it graces. “When we’re gone, it’ll still be there,” Richard says of their work, forever alive in the light.

Wild Rose Glass
447 Island Road
Harkers Island, NC 28531
(252) 659-1839
wildroseglassinfo.square.site