AleRené Designs lets Jess Reyes raise funds for the important things
Jess Reyes has loved creating with her hands and making art all her life—from crafting beaded lizards in sixth grade to making felt flowers to graphic design.
Reyes was first exposed to beading as a child, as her mother created through the form, but she took it up for herself during the COVID pandemic, when she came across artists on social media who beaded—quickly falling in love with what they were making.
Beading, or beadwork, is the art of stringing beads together with thread or a thin wire. Beadwork can appear in many works of art, but it is commonly found sewn into clothing, jewelry, and other accessories. The art form dates back to ancient times and beadwork relics have been discovered all over the world. In America, beadwork dates back to early Native American tribes, where it started as a way for people to express themselves.
Reyes taught herself to bead and incorporate the art into earrings through tutorials, and with the help of friends. What began as a hobby, turned into sharing her work on Instagram, evolving into selling her work on Shopify. After two years, she came up with the moniker “AleRené Designs”—a combination of her children’s middle names.
“I felt like once I gave a name to it, that meant I was serious, I guess, which is silly,” Reyes laughs.
Reyes says that the bulk of her ideas come to her late at night, when her mind runs wild—which also happens to be the time of day she does most of her work, since she homeschools her children during the day. Some pairs of earrings only take an hour and a half to make, while more intricate designs can take up to ten hours.
“When I first started out, everything took forever,” Reyes says. “I was learning different techniques, different materials—it took me several years to even find thread that I liked. But then once you kind of get into a groove, the longer you do it, it gets a little bit easier.”
Reyes’ designs are often bright and colorful, usually in the form of hoops or dangle earrings. She’s also created earrings inspired by pop culture icons such as Wednesday Addams and Nightmare Before Christmas. She also rarely creates the same designs over and over again—she says that it becomes too monotonous otherwise. 
But for Reyes, beading is really more than a hobby, or even a business. She’s connected with beaders from all over and built relationships through AleRené Designs—relationships she maintains even when she’s taking a break from beading.
“I have met some really amazing humans who are doing a lot of good, and it is inspiring to know that there are good people out there,” she says. “Even if I’m not making, even if I’m not posting, I’m always in connection with some of the people that I’ve met the last four years.”
Having ADHD and anxiety—which Reyes mentions on her Instagram account—beading is a way for her to keep her brain and hands busy. But it’s also become a way for her to give back to the community.
“It’s my therapy—it’s part of my therapy, anyways—that I do this,” says Reyes. “And I wanted to do it in a meaningful way.”
Previously, she has donated part of her proceeds to the Kansas City Indian Center and raised money for friends in need. Reyes says she tries to donate money to a cause with each sale.
In her latest endeavor, Pairs for Palestine, she’s donated to the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund (PCRF) and the Palestinian American Medical Association (PAMA).
Before Pairs for Palestine, Reyes had been in a bit of a creative block for a few months. But one pair of earrings she made during that time was modeled after the Palestinian keffiyeh. The keffiyeh can have several different meanings, but it has become a symbol of solidarity with Palestine in the war with Israel.
Reyes wore the earrings to a local library event, where a woman complimented her earrings, gave her a huge hug, and told her that the world needed art, especially that which is an ode to Palestinian art and tradition. After that conversation, Reyes was inspired to dedicate her time and energy to Pairs for Palestine, which she’s been doing for the past several months.
In her first round of sales back in November, she donated 80% of her profits to the PCRF. After that sale, Reyes contacted Al-Hadaf KC—the organization that has been organizing local protests in support of Palestine. 
“I wanted to connect to a local Palestinian group to see if I could donate locally, because I feel like it’s really important for us to also focus on our community here,” says Reyes.
Al-Hadaf KC recommended that she donate to PAMA, which she did for her second and third sales—donating 75% of her sales.
“I was able to donate over $500, which is way more than I thought I was gonna be able to donate,” she says. “And I hope to do it again.”
Many of the earrings have the same color theme as the Palestinian flag—red, green, white, and black. Some of the earrings more directly resemble the flag or bear symbols important in Palestinian culture such as olive leaves, while others are made to look like watermelons—a more subtle symbol of solidarity.
“It’s something that someone can wear and if a person doesn’t know any better, that sees them, they’re like, ‘Oh, those are beautiful watermelon earrings,’” Reyes says. “But in reality, it’s someone else standing up for the Palestinian people and their fight against oppression. I wanted to provide that for people who maybe can’t be as outspoken as I can and as other people can. And hopefully, one day they can be, without the risk of losing their job.”
Reyes plans to continue Pairs for Palestine for the foreseeable future—basically, she says, until the organizations she’s donating to tell her that they don’t need any more funding.
“My only hope is that people want to give and do something good for their community and for Palestine. And for all the oppressed.”
