A Comox Valley artist is headed to Hollywood later this month after being selected to contribute swag items to nominees in this year's Emmy Awards.
Dan Walker has only been making jewellery for two years but his works caught the eye of a product-selector who invited him to contribute his works to some of the entertainment industry's biggest names.
"There's a large room where we get to set up our table and then the different nominees come through at different times throughout the day and then we present them each with one of our pieces," Walker says.
The Comox artist will be heading to Tinsel-town with his silver-wares on the 17th of this month and will offer up 120 hand carved rings to celebrities. He hopes to catch the eye of those who could place future orders with him.
"The hope, the idea, is that I'll generate interest from the different nominees and perhaps they'd like to place orders with me or it could lead further to different connections," he says.
Walker and his wife will make the trip to California in their personal vehicle, laughing at the suggestion they should be provided with a limo.
"Apparently not, no. We're just driving down there. The whole thing is, we're just treating it as an adventure and just go off and have some fun and see what develops," Walker says.
Dan's wife, Theresa Brossard, will also be handing out 120 items to Californians. Rather than giving gifts for Hollywood well-to-dos, she will be distributing 120 American $5 bills, each of which will be attached to inspirational sayings, to those in need.
"It felt a little strange to go down to Hollywood and give away things to people that already have money or are famous or are not really in need so I wanted to balance it out a little bit," Brossard says.
Brossard often gives Tim Horton gift cards to those in the Comox Valley she comes across looking for spare change or appearing to be in need and she was inspired to give the donation down in California after the idea came to her in a dream.
"One of those dreams where you're a little bit anxious and we were walking in Hollywood and we were walking anxiously," says Brossard. "We had lost our way, we didn't know where the venue was and I saw somebody in trouble and thought about the gift cards. When I woke up I realized that's something I needed to work on."
Walker says the celebrities he's most looking forward to seeing are Canadian artists who are in Hollywood.
"Schitt's Creek comes up immediately to my mind. They seem to be doing really well and watching their program is just a bunch of laughs so it's going to be fun too."
