# 41: Happy Accidents: When Failure Sparks Innovation

In this episode of The Jeweler's View, Courtney Gray emphasizes the importance of viewing mistakes not as failures, but as opportunities for growth and innovation. Drawing from her experience as a metalsmith and stories from various industries, including the invention of WD-40, Post-it notes, and the light bulb, she illustrates how 'happy accidents' can lead to incredible breakthroughs. Gray shares personal anecdotes and challenges listeners to reframe their approach to mistakes, encouraging them to see these moments as stepping stones to success. She invites listeners to embrace their creative journey, learn from every misstep, and transform what might seem like setbacks into unique, defining elements of their work.

Transcript

# 41: Happy Accidents: When Failure Sparks Innovation

[00:00:00] 

Welcome to The Jeweler's View. I'm Courtney Gray, metalsmith educator and creative business strategist. After 25 years in the jewelry industry, running one of the country's top metalsmithing schools, coaching artists, advising companies and organizations, and hosting interviews with some of the best in the craft.

I finally created the kind of support I wish I'd had from the start. This podcast is a part of that. Each week I share the lessons I had to learn the hard way so you can build a rhythm that supports your creative work, your values, and the life and business you actually want. Find tools, coaching and my transform course@courtneygrayarts.com and let's get to work. 

**Courtney Gray:** Hey friend. Welcome back to The Jeweler's View. Last week, Jeanette Caines and I talked about why mistakes at the bench aren't failures to fear. [00:01:00] They're gold mines for growth. We laughed about melted gold, missed solder joints, and those moments where you just have to take a step back, breathe and try again.

That conversation was all about the everyday reality of mistakes in the studio. This got me thinking, of course, going a little deeper on the subject. And today I wanna zoom out from the bench and look at how those same moments, what I like to call happy accidents show up everywhere in science and design.

In history, and yes, in jewelry studios just like mine and yours. Some of the best things that we've ever made wouldn't exist without a misstep, and sometimes those missteps don't just save the project, they make it better than it would've been if everything had gone to plan.

Now a happy accident is when something goes wrong or at least not according to plan, and it ends up [00:02:00] giving you something useful, surprising, or even game changing in jewelry that might be discovering a new texture when your solder flows somewhere unexpected

in science, it might be a failed experiment that accidentally solves a different problem entirely. The magic is how you respond if you treat it as wasted time or let it be frustrating, it will be if you treat it as data and possibility, it becomes the stepping stone to your next breakthrough. Jeanette called Failure, a gold mine last week, and I think of happy accidents as the little nuggets you find inside that mine sometimes when you least expect it.

So I wanted to start with a few stories outside our industry because they're proof that this is universal,

so how about WD 40? The name stands for Water Displacement [00:03:00] 40th. Formula 39 tries That didn't work on the 40th try. They nailed it. Now imagine if they had stopped at 39, we wouldn't have the product. That's now in almost every garage in workshop. Sometimes the win is literally one more try away. What about Post-it notes?

A chemist at 3M was trying to invent a super strong adhesive. Instead, he got a weak, low T one that was useless for his project until years later, someone realized it would be perfect for sticky notes that you could reposition your wrong result Might be perfect for something else entirely. So stay open.

Imagine life without the light bulb. Thomas Edison tested more than 6,000 plant fibers before finding a filament that worked long enough to be practical. He's often quoted saying, I have not failed. I've just found [00:04:00] 10,000 ways that won't work.

The doesn't work list is part of the process. How about the airplane? The Wright brothers didn't just roll their flyer out of a barn and take off. They spent four years testing over a thousand wing designs in a homemade wind tunnel.

Every unstable flight gave them the data to refine the next attempt. Each crash was a blueprint for the next flight.

In 1912, Cartier unveiled the mystery clock. A clock so magical that the hands seemed to float on a rock crystal with no visible mechanism. It took a year of prototypes and many, many failed attempts. Each time something didn't work, they refine the design until the illusion was perfect.

Refinement through failure can elevate a good idea into a masterpiece. So try to remember that right when [00:05:00] things don't go as planned. Now, I promised you this isn't just something that happens in history books, it happens in our studios all the time. When I first started my garage custom jewelry business, I had a commission for four pendants for a wedding the wedding was just two weeks away. Everything was writing on the master casting coming out perfectly.

Now, when I pulled it from the investment, it had failed. No salvaging this at all. I remember this clearly, and this was probably two decades ago. I stormed around the studio like 10 times, furious, confused, and honestly panicking a little bit. Two weeks isn't much time for a whole redo

but then. I found myself right back at the bench, and all I could do was take a deep breath and start carving again. That second time around it came out more symmetrical, better proportioned, and ironically, it was [00:06:00] way better than the first one. If that casting had succeeded, the client would've gotten the okay version, not the great version.

Now, this one's hilarious. There's my friend, an incredible artisan, Barry Perez. One day he was snacking at the bench and he spilled hot salsa on his work. Most of us would've groaned, cleaned it off, maybe pickled it and started over. But Barry noticed that the spill had left a patina that he'd never seen before.

He ended up keeping it, and not only that, he duplicated this over and over again, that oops, became a signature finish for some of his future work. Those are the moments I'm talking about here. The detours that open doors you didn't even know were there. Mistakes pull us out of autopilot. They make us stop and pay attention.

They push us into problem solving mode and force us to work with what's in front of us. [00:07:00] Not just the picture in your head,

perfection is predictable, but breakthroughs live in the unexpected. Sometimes the thing that you think ruined your work is the thing that might make it unforgettable. Here's my challenge for you. Next time something goes wrong and it will pause. Before you scrap it, ask yourself, what did this teach me?

Or what else could this become? That quick pause can turn a disaster into your next signature technique. Remember, failure isn't proof. You can't, it's proof that you're trying. If you have a great, happy accident story, whether it's in the studio, the kitchen, the garden, share it and tag me.

I would love to hear it. I'm @CourtneyGrayArts. If you missed last week's conversation with the fabulous and saucy Jeanette Kanes about why mistakes are [00:08:00] goldmines, go back and give it a listen. It's the perfect companion to this episode, and it got me really thinking about failure in a whole new way.

Until next time, keep showing up. Keep experimenting and give yourself room to learn yes, to fail a little so you can learn even more

if you haven't already. I want you to jump on my website. I have been a writing machine. I cannot tell you how much I've been writing, so I've started a blog and it's on Courtney gray arts.com, where you can also find other episodes of the podcast. My transform course and all the other groovy things that I'm putting together for you.

So check it out. Let me know what you think of the blog also, be sure you're getting my emails, which accompany this podcast every week. I'm here cheering you on. Every failure, every happy accident.

I'll see you next week. 

Thanks for listening to The Jeweler's View. If today's episode gave you something to think [00:09:00] about, consider sending it to a friend or share it on social and tag me at Courtney Gray Arts. You'll find tools, coaching resources, and the transform course@courtneygrayarts.com. And if no one's told you this lately, remember you're not behind.

You're becoming exactly the kind of maker your business needs and that kind of depth. It takes time. I'll be back next week, same time, same tough love, onward and upward. I.