ROCKLAND—In the back of the antique store Rockland Marketplace, a wire shelving unit holds dozens of glass jars and plastic bins of shells from all over the world, from green sea urchins to the tiniest white shells no bigger than a baby’s fingernail.

They belonged to shell artist Sherry Lary of Friendship, who has now retired from the craft. Hundreds of dollars worth of these shells collected over a five-year-period are now up for sale.

“I’ve now got my dining room back,” she joked.

Shell art, also called shell work, is one of the oldest crafts in the world, going back to primitive societies near the ocean. It was only natural for people by the sea to collect shells and use them to decorate furniture, clothing and small personal items. The art form revived in the Victorian era.

Not everyone interested in the crafting of shell art is accomplished, as anyone who has ever seen an amateur music box at a yard sale can attest. But Lary’s work is truly intricate; she is a master. There is an elaborate symmetry and layered depth of color to her pieces.

A former art dealer, she first encountered a Maine-made Victorian antique table completely decorated in shells in 2006.

“It blew me away,” she said.

What started as a fascination, turned into a hobby. Quickly, that turned into sales and commissions.

“The more I got into it, I learned that there were palaces and grottos in England just covered floor to ceiling in shell work.”

Very few of the shells she collected herself. She bought them from shell purveyors, who bought shells from people who combed beaches all over the world. The rarest in her collection is now in a locked case by the shelving unit at Rockland Marketplace.

“It’s a jar of janitha,” she said. “They’re the most incredible, fragile purple, color. It took me years to find them. One of the most fun aspects of shell work was researching where all of these shells came from and the history behind them and I finally found a shell seller in England. These were next to impossible to get.”

At first, she just made small projects like candlesticks, vintage Mexican crosses, keepsake boxes and frames—even a Cinderella-style slipper.

 “After I’d been making these small things for years I discovered a book called Sailors’ Valentines: The Journey Through Time. It just rocked my world and I was just obsessed for years,” she said

In the 19th century, “Sailors' Valentines" were all rage. Homesick sailors would buy these octagonal picture frames decorated with shell work from curiosity shops in the spice islands and bring them home as gifts for their mothers and girlfriends. Today antique Sailors' Valentines sell for between $4 and $30,000.  Recently, the craft has been revived and many contemporary shell artists are taking the form to new heights and interpreting them in a variety of fun and different ways.

Like a knitter, sometimes she worked from a mapped out pattern; sometimes she improvised.

“I worked on a solid piece of octagon wood,” she said. “I’d divide the lines into a pie shape and whatever shells I had would dictate the pattern. I did it every breathing moment and just burned out,” she said. “Sailors’ Valentines were one of the reasons I had to stop doing shell work. It’s very limiting and I actually liked the freedom when I worked on a box instead.”

Now that she’s finally let her collection and her obsession go and her dining room is once again, fit to host people, she doesn’t know what she’ll do next for a hobby.

“To be honest, I’m a little lost at sea,” she said.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com