Friday, August 17, 2007

Erica Weiner


What's a Friday without some pretty new things to look at?

We just received some beautiful jewelry from a new designer named Erica Weiner that we're so happy to be working with. We think the work she does is both witty and beautiful. Here's a little background info on this busy designer.



In 2005, in her small tenement apartment on the Lower East Side of Manhattan (only a block from where her paternal grandmother was born in 1909), Erica made her first piece of jewelry. The pair of mis-matched earrings were a gift for a good friend's birthday, and they garnered so much attention that they sparked the birth of a mini-empire.



Erica graduated from Vassar College in 2001 with a degree in Art History. A largely self-taught craftswoman, the only formal visual art training she received was during a year abroad in the textiles department at the Glasgow School of Art in Scotland. After school she spent time as a costume designer for Broadway shows and as a seamstress and design assistant at various fashion houses in New York. While learning about design and production from these freelance jobs, she gathered a collection of curiosities and used them to develop a small line of jewelry with an emphasis on affordability and craftsmanship. By incorporating natural objects with mass-produced, vintage-style metal pieces, mixing in antique pieces and focusing on non-precious metals, Erica can produce inexpensive jewelry that doesn't look cheap.



These days, Erica works closely with her good friend, Lindsay Salmon, whose impeccable sense of style deeply influences the ever-evolving collection. They travel around the country searching out interesting materials and buying up peculiar jewelry closeout lots. Because they make use of limited and vintage materials, there are no seasonal, set "collections".



We only have a few of these lovely pieces to start with, so if you fall in love with something snap it up soon, there's only one of each at HQ!

www.ericaweiner.com

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