Paul Pearman

With his black taco hat, shoulder-length locks and stubbled chin, Pearman looks as though he would fit right in with the likes of rockers Keith Richards or Kid Rock, just a few of the celebrities who buckle up with Pearman products.

I soon found out, however, as I sipped his tasty concoction, though this gregarious artist, animated as a colt in May, exudes the personality of a partyer, Pearman is all business when it comes to his art. There is little time to roll with the jet set as he is always on the move, searching for new stones, glass, fossilized teeth and gems to use in his colorful and often whimsical creations. A single buckle can take up to 40 hours to create, depending on the intricacy of the design, and since his vibrant buckles are some of the most collected, he is assiduously making them year-round, working 16-hour days.

“I have to produce all the time,” he said. “Basically, it just turned 2010. Every piece I did for 2009 is gone.”

Pearman shows off one of his unique buckles.

“I’ve always been an athlete, but the whole time I was an athlete, I would always doodle,” he said.

Pearman, 49, is originally from Bakersfield, Calif., but he moved to Fort Gordon in Augusta, Ga., when he was a child. His father was in the Air Force. Pearman has always been an artist of some sort, and he originally began as a painter, first working in oils.

“I did oil paintings for 20 years before I started dabbling in the glass. It’s one of those things where you don’t really have a choice. I’ve always rendered,” he said.

But it was when he was inspired to cover his paintings with glass and hand-nipped tiles that his first mosaics evolved.

“I wanted to do something that looked like a painting, but it was glass,” he said. “It’s the mixing of mediums that can create the most elegant pieces of art.”

butterfly buckle

“What motivated me to make belt buckles was that I couldn’t find one that I really liked,” he said. “I decided I would make myself the coolest belt buckle on the planet. Then people saw it and wanted it. So I made another one and another one, and that’s how it started.”

Pearman has worked in mosaic art for more than a decade, and his abilities go far beyond belt buckles. He has created designs for residential and commercial customers, making mosaic home décor items like mirrors, kitchen backsplashes, flooring, fireplace surrounds, and home and garden accents. He has also carved foam, creating an Irish castle with stained-glass windows for his dog, Pupster.

In fact, he is now building a new art studio on Lake Olmstead, in Augusta, from the ground up, which will be designed with Pearman’s inimitable vision. The building will consist of brick, rock, wood, stucco, shell and high-tech architectural foam. Some of the amenities include a round foyer, an art nouveau hand-carved door he found in Chicago and a 40-foot-wide, two-story-high window.

“It’s gonna be crazy,” he said. “There won’t be a square edge or flat line in the entire house. The inside of this house will look like a gigantic open area. It will just flow, from stucco to glass to wood.”

Those killer buckles
At first glance, Pearman’s buckles possess the characteristics of an impressionistic painting, with fluid, dynamic curvilinear designs and vibrant brushstrokes. On closer observation, the natural forms of shells, fossilized shark teeth, stones and gems provide an organic and timeless dimension.

“Buckles are something you gotta put in your hand,” Pearman said. “You need to feel them, feel their weight, to truly appreciate them.”

cat-eye buckle

“It’s the biggest fossil and gem show on planet Earth,” Pearman said. “You can buy a Tyrannosaurus rex. One actually sold there three years ago,” he said.

Apparently, a farmer found the bottom jaw of the T. rex after a flood washed over his property. He hired some archeologists to dig it up, reassemble it and put it on the open market.

“Some of the ammonites, fossilized nautilus shells, turn into solid opal, and some of them are gigantic. The big ones that are intact, they keep them in the bedrock, and they expose the pretty half when they cut into it. You’ll have a 495-pound opal. It’s killer,” Pearman said.

tooth buckle

Pearman has been attending the Augusta Futurity for six years, and he also displays at national shows such as the American Craft Council Show in Atlanta, one of the most distinguished fine craft shows in the United States. He has also hosted trunk shows at prestigious boutiques in Los Angeles, New York, Dallas and Nashville.

Pearman’s partner in his thriving business is his wife of six years, Michele, and he credits her with the business acumen necessary to make the buckles move. Dark-haired and businesslike, Michele moves with quiet assurance behind the scenes, and is the yin to Paul’s yang.

“She is instrumental. Without Michele, none of this would happen,” Pearman said. “She’s making me this huge book of all my designs. I’ve learned so much about design over the last five years. I just want to make the most beautiful pieces I can.”

I’ll drink to that.