Shipping & returns

It depends on what it is. Canvases get corner protectors, glassine over the surface, and rigid board on both faces. Ceramics and glass are double-boxed with a floating inner carton. Bags travel stuffed, so they arrive with their shape. Nothing rattles, and every box is cut to the piece rather than pulled off a shelf.

Orders are packed within 3 to 7 business days of payment, from California, USA. You get a tracking number by email the moment the label is made. Everything is sent tracked and insured for the full purchase price.

Shipping within the US runs from $10 to $40, set per piece. A small pouch and a framed canvas do not cost the same to send, and neither does a short hop across California and a box going to the other coast. Each piece is posted separately, so an order with two pieces in it pays postage twice. That is not a surcharge, it is two boxes. Orders over $300 ship free within the US.

Whatever applies to your piece is shown on its listing and again in your cart, before you pay. There is no shipping calculated after the fact and no surcharge added later: the figure you see is the figure charged.

A piece engraved with your words is doubly final. It is cut by hand, once, and cannot be undone or altered, and a piece carrying someone else’s name cannot be offered to another buyer. Please check the spelling before you order: it is engraved exactly as typed. A mistake made by the studio is the studio’s to put right.

There are no returns and no refunds for a change of mind. Please be certain before you buy, and ask anything you need to first: measure the wall, ask for another photograph, ask what the colour does under a lamp. Questions are welcome and answered by the person who made the piece.

The reason is not meanness. Every piece is the only one of its kind. When one sells it comes off the site, other people stop seeing it, and it is packed and posted by hand. A return means all of that happened for nothing, and the piece comes back having travelled twice.

You are asked to confirm you understand this before an order can be placed, so nobody discovers it afterwards.

Final sale does not mean you are stuck with a broken or misdescribed piece. If a piece arrives damaged, or is materially not what the listing described, tell the studio within 14 days of delivery with photographs.

A refund, partial refund, repair, or replacement is then arranged at the artist’s discretion, judged on the piece and the problem. That is a genuine commitment, and it is separate from changing your mind about a piece that arrived exactly as described.

These are made by one person by hand, not produced in a factory. The work is done with real skill and care, and it is also not machine finished: expect small irregularities in a seam, a brush edge, a glaze, or a join. Two sides of a piece may not be identical to the millimetre. Wood grain, clay, and leather vary from batch to batch.

That is the nature of the thing, not a defect, and it is why the piece looks like it was made by somebody. If you want an exactly repeatable, machine-perfect finish, a mass-produced item will serve you better and there is no shame in saying so.

You are asked to confirm you understand this before ordering, and it is the reason a piece that simply shows the marks of being handmade is not treated as damaged.

Photograph the box before you open it any further, then the work, then email atelier@phoena.art within 48 hours. Everything ships insured, and a refund or a replacement piece is sorted from there. Do not throw the packaging away until it is settled.