“My wife would say that it started with a collection of coffee cups,” says Charles Duddingston, laughing, “but then she’s a jewelry collector.” Duddingston, senior vice president, wealth management advisor, and a founder of the Duddingston Sylvester Group at Merrill Lynch in Minneapolis, has long been a collector of craft.

“Not every piece is the same; it hasn’t come off of a conveyor belt,” he says. “What you find has imperfections in it, like life itself. It becomes a piece of you that isn’t perfect, and I think that always appealed to me when it comes to handcraft.”

An ACC board member from 2013 to 2020, and board chair from 2018 to 2020, Duddingston has integrated his board work with his business by gifting American Craft Council memberships to the families with which his team works. Moreover, he and his team have sponsored nearly all local ACC events for the past decade.

“I always attended our shows, no matter where they were,” he says, “to see the impact they had on the artists, the public, and young people working at the make-it-yourself displays and trying a medium they’d never encountered before. It was really satisfying.”

Navigating the pandemic was one of Duddingston’s primary challenges as board chair. “Those were difficult times,” he recalls, “and I’m proud that we got the organization through that era successfully, and with the ability to move forward and continue with leadership.” Duddingston adds that he appreciates his time with ACC and the connections he’s made with artists. “My hope for the future of craft is that we continue creating new ways to get people together, to create new modes of commerce between makers and patrons.”

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This article was made possible with support from the Windgate Foundation.