‘I was a marine biologist, but also a maker’ | Erin Heydenreich

Published 1:30 am Wednesday, March 18, 2026

Erin Heydenreich always knew she wanted to be a marine biologist. She grew up in Portland, took a gap year in Mexico, where her family visited frequently as a child, and eventually found her way to a little island off the coast of Washington. An apprenticeship in marine mammal field studies brought her to Friday Harbor Labs, where she met Ken Balcomb, the founder of the Center for Whale Research.

“He offered me a job quite randomly, and I didn’t have any plans for that summer, so I stayed,” she told the Journal. Initially, Heydenreich was helping with the census of the Southern Residents by doing photo identification. Then she started running the Earthwatch program, which coordinated volunteers who wanted to come help with research — something she ended up doing for 15 years.

“I just worked my way up the organization and kept coming back year after year!” she said. In the winters, she’d go live in her favorite place from childhood: Mexico. (While she no longer winters there now, she does still visit regularly — the day of the Journal interview, in fact, she was unpacking after barely arriving home.)

Life continued — she was living her dream life, things were going according to plan. But everything came to a screeching halt when her mom died suddenly when Heydenreich was only 26. She took a break. She moved home with her dad. Life was on hold. And to fill the time, she took up a hobby from her childhood.

“I always wanted to be a marine biologist. That was the main goal, even as a child,” she said. “But I was also a maker. I was a fiddler and a creator of things.” Heydenreich returned to it to keep her hands busy as her heart grieved. She took a wire-wrapping class at the community college, and the teacher encouraged her to sell her work.

“It was just this thing that I did on the side for a long time, even when I went back to the Center,” she said, referring to her return to the island and the whales. “I went back to doing marine biology because that’s what I always said I was going to do. I was trying to pick up where I left off in a way.”

And that’s what she did. She worked at the Center and kept jewelry on the side. Even when Heydenreich was asked to sell at the farmers market, which marked the start of her jewelry business here, she was still regularly on call for the whales. They were the priority — they were the plan, after all.

She became an umbrella artist at Roche and eventually shared a booth there with a friend. Even then, it was a side gig. Heydenreich was a marine biologist first and foremost. Until… she wasn’t.

She later wrote in a blog post on her website: “I realized that what I had wanted for so long came to define me and my life in a way that no longer aligned with how I felt and who I was. And slowly but surely, my dream job became more like a box I kept that part of myself locked up in. Eventually, that voice became too loud to ignore.”

Heydenreich knew she had to make the leap.

She opened Betina Roza as a solo booth at Roche and online for continuing customers in 2014, which meant increasing her inventory, building her website and learning how to run an actual business.

“It really forced me to be a real business person,” she laughed. “Inventory, consistency in my designs, production. Eventually, I hired somebody. I have someone on the island who helps me make jewelry. I work with people in Mexico who help me make things. I had to get smart about it.”

In 2024, someone offered Heydenreich a space in town for a boutique. It caught her off guard.

“I was thinking that’s something I’d do in five years,” she remembered. “It didn’t work out with that space, but I was really excited about the idea and the aesthetic and everything came to me almost instantly. The store was a fully formed idea in my mind. It felt like the right next thing to do.”

She wanted a space to show her jewelry, but also with an evolving inventory — a store that looked different each visit.

“I’m changing up what I have all of the time,” Heydenreich explained. “I have one-of-a-kind things because I’m bringing in a lot of it from Mexico. I want it to be a place you can go over and over and find something unique and new and different each time.”

In September, she opened the Betina Roza boutique at Cannery Landing, next to the ferry and San Juan Roasters. It’s a sweet space with textiles, clothing, bags, gifts, books, tarot cards, candles – and of course, her handmade jewelry.

“It’s stuff that I like!” she laughed. “I’m sure I could fill up a bigger space if one came around.”