Sarah Gomes

 Born and raised in Whangarei, Sarah has lived in the Onerahi community for all but 6 years of her life. In those 6 years she studied Consumer and Applied Design at Otago University, sang and played piano with rock and blues bands in Hamilton, then moved to Devonport, Auckland where she and her Brazilian husband welcomed their first daughter. They moved back to Whangarei in 2001 where they welcomed two more gorgeous girls. 

Sarah is a craftsperson and from a young age displayed a natural inclination towards “making stuff”. She enjoys many expressions of creativity and works with various materials including paper, fabric, leather, paua laminate and native timber veneers to name a few. 

In 2011 she began Happy as Larry, a fun wee hustle where Sarah made detailed soft toy replicas of children’s artwork. She was one of only a handful around the world doing this at the time and enjoyed national TV and local media promotion at its height. Cheap overseas production of the same concept brought Happy as Larry to a natural end, and from there she turned her sewing attention to working with leather. 

Sarah is unapologetically “more is more” in her creative approach, and whatever the medium her work always has great attention to detail at the heart of the finishing. Whether it’s a reloved leather-upholstered footstool, a hand-beaded lambskin purse or framed paper, native timber and paua artwork, one of the standout characteristics of her work is the longer you look the more you’ll see. There’s an old saying “the devil is in the detail”, but Sarah would argue that’s where the beauty and the wonder will be found.