Friday, January 27, 2012
It was great to be a finalist for Fashion Group International‘s Rising Star Award for fine jewelry last year, but it was even better to win the 2012 award yesterday! The fact that gorgeous designer/blogger Stacy Lomman was also a finalist in the women’s ready-to-wear category this year was a bonus. I wouldn’t have been involved with Rising Star if it weren’t for Stacy, so I was happy she was being recognized too. I was excited to pay tribute to her (and to you other bloggers) from the stage. This was my little speech:
“This is a huge honor.
Thank you to Fashion Group International for supporting independent and emerging designers.
Thanks also to my family, friends, customers, colleagues and the many fashion bloggers who have supported me for years.
I’ll mention just two people by name. My husband Paul Steiger who got me interested in jewelry and now keeps a roof over my head while I pursue my dream.
And one of today’s women’s wear finalists — Stacy Lomman — who first told me about the Rising Star awards, nominated me AND made the dress I’m wearing right now. Without her I’d be sitting at home today, wearing jeans and a black t-shirt. Special thanks to Stacy.”
Well, that was what I wrote in advance — just in case — and I mostly stuck to the script, but I have a vague memory of blurting, “OH MY GOD!” into the microphone before I said anything else.
The beautiful red peplum dress that Stacy made for me for the awards was a surprise. She had it nearly all done before she had me stop by her place for a fitting. I thought I was just going to borrow one of her old samples! She made herself an asymmetric blue top a couple of days before the event. We both wore my jewelry. Here we are with my award right after the ceremony.
All the finalists got a corsage to wear.
This wasn’t Stacy’s year to win, but, as she said to me for my recent Huffington Post story on the challenges of small business, her nomination proves she’s someone to watch, only 18 months after launching her line. (My first nomination came after five years in business.) Fashion Group International encourages finalists to try, try again. Many winners get their awards after multiple nominations, so I have no doubt Stacy will have her moment. I’m also sure we’ll see more of the other fine-jewelry finalists: sisters Amaia and Yolanda Torrubia of Torrubia & Torrubia, and Jessica Kagan Cushman. All three ladies were delightful. Stacy and I took a picture with the Torrubias.
After the awards, we had more good news: with a couple of days left to go, Stacy is only $150 away from raising enough money on Kickstarter to pay for her Fall 2012 runway show. If you want to help make up the difference and make the show possible …
Much love to gorgeous blogger Susan of Style Made by Hand for getting Stacy to this level.
I’ll have more pictures of my Stacy Lomman dress and my awards-ceremony guests — MrB, GeorgeB and the lovely Christine — in the next post.
UPDATED TO ADD NEWS LINKS:
- Daily Fashion Report mentioned my tribute to Stacy.
- I love that WWD called us “young” designers in the headline.
- A Fashion Week Daily reporter was at my table and I never even got to say hello to her!
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Yesterday, I had an eight-hour photoshoot for my new lookbook with model Tina J of Fusion Models. Every time I am at a shoot, I am shocked anew at how unglamorous a model’s day is. Poor Tina had to wedge rings onto her fingers over and over … then pry them off with some help from Vaseline. By the end of the shoot, her knuckles were swollen. For one look, she was lying on a piece of Plexiglass with photographer Shane LaVancher standing above her and her head balanced on a jar of pins (it was the only thing that was the right height). And I think she spent a full hour with her lips pursed, pretending to blow into my Virginia Woolf Whistle. Seriously uncomfortable. There’s also a lot of waiting around while we perfect the lighting … the job is definitely not all that it’s cracked up to be.
Here are some Instagram shots of the behind-the-scenes action.
Tina getting her makeup done by Leora Edut. Click for Leora's site.
Manicure by Sylvia.
Getting comfortable on Plexiglass and pins.
When dumbbells weigh more than the model, it helps to have muscle-y men around to assist.
Speaking of models, I wound up on some party planner’s mailing list and was amused to get this email about an event at Tiffany (spelling errors are not mine):
“Due to an overwhelming response for the Tiffany Event tonight, they have pre-wristbanded their VIP’s due to capacity and fire marshall issues. They will not be able to grant acces to my guests at Tiffany & Co. this evening. Any models who rsvp’ed will be admitted to the event, but they cannot bring any guests unless thier guests are models too.”
I wondered briefly if would-be guests just had to be tall and skinny in a model-like way or if they had to bring their portfolios as proof. Then came the followup email (again, spelling errors not mine):
“This is a message retracting the statement from the prior email that only models will be admitted and that their guests had to be models too.
We have been informed that the best looking guests will be admitted wether they are models or not. Models can bring whoever they want to the event. We were worried that good people might be turned away at the door, but have been assured that the best looking people will have no problem.”
High!Larious! No breakfast … or lunch, dinner or party at Tiffany’s for you uglies! Of course, a preference for the pretty people has been a door policy since the Studio 54 days, but to put it in writing and send it out to the world? On behalf of Tiffany, whose name is synonymous with high quality and good taste? I am clutching my pearls with horror!
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
I had a go-see for models for my new lookbook on Monday. (This is the first time I’m using a model in a lookbook; we’re shooting it later today.) On a go-see, a model comes in with her portfolio, so you can see her in person and look at her photos. If the go-see is for a runway show, the model prances back and forth a few times to show her runway walk. I didn’t request hand models — I’m not shooting rings exclusively — so a couple of the models who came in seemed a little surprised to be trying on rings instead of prancing.
Here's a little Instagram shot of Tina, my final choice, during her ring try-on.
When I show my jewelry to stores or magazines, it’s like a go-see, so it was interesting to be on the other side. I know from experience that rejection feels personal when you’re on the receiving end, but I didn’t actually dislike any of the gorgeous models who stopped by. I simply had very specific requirements: short hair, an edgy portfolio, and fingers that fit the rings. There was nothing at all wrong with the long-haired, girl-next-door models. They just weren’t what I needed.
As for the ones whose fingers were too big for the rings, that’s nothing anyone should ever feel bad about — ring size depends on bone structure as much as weight. There’s no negative connotation to any ring size. My sample size for a woman’s ring is 6, which is fairly mid-range. It usually fits on at least one finger of a woman’s hand — a pinky, if nothing else — so a customer can get a sense of the ring, which she then orders in her size. When the first model at the go-see had the right look but couldn’t get rings on all her fingers, I briefly wished that I had samples in a broader range of sizes. Then I thought, “How would I decide which rings should be which sizes? And what if they still didn’t fit this particular model?” Basically, I was brought back to my 2010 post on sample sizes, in which I pointed out that, by definition, clothing/jewelry samples don’t come in the full range of sizes. Fine jewelry in particular is too expensive to make in unnecessary multiples.
Incidentally, my right index finger is a perfect size 6. My other fingers range in size from 2.5 (pinky) to 7.25 (thumb). Alas, easy-to-fit fingers are not enough to qualify as a model, so I had to bring in a professional. I can’t wait to see the pictures!
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Check out my story about the agony and ecstasy of small business on the Huffington Post today!
If you’ve read me for a while, you might recognize some of the issues raised in the story from my Get Smart series of posts on this blog.
The story also includes a reminder about gorgeous designer Stacy Lomman’s Kickstarter campaign to raise money for her next runway show. Stacy only has five days left. She’s getting close but the rule of Kickstarter is that if you don’t meet your fundraising goal, you don’t get ANY of the money. If you haven’t already sponsored her, please consider doing it now.
Feel free to leave any comments you have on the Huffington Post’s site.
Monday, January 23, 2012
Gung hay fat choy! Happy Chinese New Year! It’s the lucky year of the dragon and you should get one of my dragon jewelry designs to celebrate. Sure, it will cost you a pretty penny, but it’s much cheaper in the long run than having a dragon-year child. Eighteen years from now, you won’t be sending my jewelry to college.
Empress Wu dragon earrings. Click for more information.
Empress Wu dragon ring. Click for more information.
Empress Wu dragon cufflinks. Click for more information.
Queen Min dragon ring. Click for more information.
Friday, January 20, 2012
When gorgeous rapper Gangsta Boo tweeted a video tease of her upcoming project, I got a pleasant surprise. There’s a nice clear shot of my hashtag ring at 32 seconds!
Many customers send me photos of themselves wearing my jewelry but I’ve only seen a design on video/film once before, when my Cleopatra earrings were featured in Sex and the City 2. Seeing a piece in action is very exciting.
You can get your own sterling-silver hashtag ring for $115 on my website.
Click the photo to shop.
Don’t forget to follow Boo on Twitter. Say hi (or #yeahoe) and tell her I sent you! And if you haven’t heard “Throw It Up,” her song with Yelawolf and Eminem, here it is.
I’m addicted to this song!
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
People often ask me if it’s okay to mix yellow and white metals. My answer? “Hell, yes!”
I didn’t always have that mindset, though. I too grew up thinking jewelry had to be matchy-matchy. I don’t know where that fashion taboo against combining different-colored metals came from. One of the most famous jewelry designs in the world — Cartier’s tri-color gold Trinity — was introduced way back in 1924. And if Cartier says it’s good, it’s good.
A classic Trinity design by Cartier. Click for more information.
Then, in the early ’80s, there was a big fad for interwoven yellow, white and rose gold herringbone chains. It wasn’t as good as Cartier, by a long shot. Still, I got one as a birthday gift. We all did! I never wore mine after high school but I had it in my possession till last year, when the price of gold hit a new high. At that point, I melted it down and sold it along with some other unworn pieces. It looked like this necklace from Zales.
Tri-tone herringbone chain from Zales. Click for more information.
You’d think that if it’s okay to mix metals in a single piece of jewelry, it would be okay to wear different color rings on different fingers. But, for some reason, a lot of us are scared to do it. I overcame that concern after I designed my own engagement ring and wedding bands in white metal. There was no way I was going to be stuck wearing only white forever. So this is how I wear rings now.
Photo by Jennine Tamm. Platinum, silver and gold rings are all designed by Wendy Brandes.
And this is how I wear bracelets.
Yellow, white and rose gold bracelets worn together in November. Click for original post.
This New Year’s Eve I mixed metals in a different way. I’d gotten a silver manicure from celebrity manicurist Tracylee Percival because I expected to wear a dress with silver details. At the last minute, I changed to a gold sequin dress. I wound up loving the way the silver nails looked with the gold dress. You can see it in this picture of me with MrB. Note the mixed metal rings.
Click for more New Year's Eve photos.
I wore gold shoes and carried a gold purse on New Year’s, but now I wish I went all out and did silver accessories. Next time I wear that dress, I will.
Thankfully, the fashion police have never ticketed me for such behavior, so I feel it’s safe to encourage other people to mix it up as well. In 2009, when gorgeous blogger Elizabeth asked me to redesign an old ruby-and-diamond cocktail ring for her, I made her yellow, rose and white gold stacking rings.
Elizabeth's stacking rings. Click for more information.
More recently, my desire to get folks to break the mixed-metal style “rule” inspired me to make a miniature version of my Siobhan perma-stacked stacking ring. The original ring consists of 10 skinny bands — all attached — made from 18K yellow gold. (In the picture of my hands above, the Siobhan is the second ring from the left.)
My Siobhan ring design. Click for more information.
I’ve done mixed-metal versions of the ring for two custom engagement rings. Those rings had fewer individual bands but they were thicker than the originals, so the rings were still fairly wide.
Heather's engagement ring in 18K yellow and white gold. Click for more photos.
Susan's engagement ring in 18K yellow and white. Click for more photos.
For a long time, more conservative ladies have been asking me for a skinny version of the Siobhan ring. I wasn’t super-excited to do it. First of all, I think the beauty of the Siobhan is in its unusual width and the number of the bands. (The design was inspired by the mother of my friend Siobhan. Siobhan’s mother collected wedding bands from markets around the world and wore them stacked on all of her fingers.) Second, I’ve discovered the hard way that, while it’s fine to take popular demand for new designs into account when it comes to less-expensive silver jewelry, all the gals who swear they’ll buy an expensive gold design — if you do it just the way they want it — tend to evaporate once the piece is available. Retailers are even worse when it comes to vague promises. Here is my free Bitchtastic Guide to Business™ tip of the day for all you small business owners: Has a buyer from a prestigious national store told you that she will definitely order from you if you make this, that or the other thing? Check your bank account. Is money from the store in it? No? Then check your orders. Do you see a piece of paper from that store with a written commitment to pay a certain amount by a certain date for a certain amount of product? No? Then that’s exactly what you say to the buyer: “No.” Because if you make that stuff on spec, you won’t get an order, you won’t get paid, and you’ll end up writing a Bitchtastic Guide to Business™ book to warn people against making the same dumb mistakes you made.
Due to those dumb mistakes, I dismissed the idea of a mini Siobhan ring for years. Then, a few months ago, when I was talking about mixing metals with my gorgeous makeup artist friend, Tennille Nielsen. The idea of mixing metals in a mini Siobhan made the concept interesting to me. Because tricolor pieces are common, as I’ve shown you, I decided to do four colors for the Siobhan: 18K yellow, white, rose and green gold. (Green gold is really a greenish yellow.) Here is the result — and January 2012′s Jewel of the Month. From top to bottom, the gold colors are green, white, rose and yellow. Photos are by SquareMoose.
Mini Siobhan, front view. Click to shop.
As with the original Siobhan ring, I gave each band its own texture. And, just like with the original, the bands are attached in the back. The bands have a lot of room to move around, which makes them look like authentic stacking rings rings, but you never have to worry about losing one of your stack.
Mini Siobhan, back view, showing bands' range of movement.
Now I’m sure I’m going to have at least one person tell me that she’d buy the mini Siobhan if only the bands were all one color. That’s fine! You can have them all yellow, all white, all rose or all green if you want. I’m always happy to do custom work. Holla at me at wbjewelry at hotmail dot com to place a special order.
Writing about the different colors brings me back to my first sentence. I must confess that it was a lie. No one ever asks me if it’s okay to mix yellow and white metals. The question is always whether or not it is permissible to mix gold and silver. The problem is that white gold is silver-colored, as is platinum, but neither of them are the metal “silver.” The mini Siobhan ring is not made of “gold and silver.” It’s 100% gold. My Memento Mori skull and bones necklace, however, IS (18K) gold and (sterling) silver.
Memento mori necklace in gold and silver. Click to shop.
So when I’m describing color combinations to y’all, I use the words “yellow” and “white.” If I’m describing the mixture of two different metals, I’ll say “gold” and “silver.” Got it? Good! Merry mixing!
NOTE: The price of the mini Siobhan will be announced soon — I’m exploring manufacturing options.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Well, the outfit isn’t terrible … just the blurry photo is. It was too windy and cold out for a redo; I ran inside right after this. Whatever! If you want excellent jewelry, you’re on the right blog. If you want excellent outfit photography, go practically anywhere else. I have to pick my battles, and the camera has officially kicked my ass and won the war.
Despite technical challenges, I did want to get a picture of the Zang Toi dress and sweater combo I wore last night, because I haven’t worn them for a few years.
This is an autofocus camera. WTF?
What Wendy Wore
Sweater: Zang Toi (2009)
Dress: Zang Toi (2009)
Bag: Prada (I think the bag is from 2005; I bought it last year on consignment.)
Shoes: Prada (2010)
Rings: All my own designs
Here I am wearing the same thing while hanging out with gorgeous bloggers in San Francisco in 2009.
Click for original post.
I wore the dress by itself to Zang Toi’s runway show later that year.
With Zang. Click for original post.
I don’t know whether I’ve worn these pieces since then. If I did, no photos were taken. Long breaks don’t bother me though. I plan to keep Zang’s pieces forever, so I know I’ll have a chance to wear them again.
UPDATED TO ADD: Just remembered that I have a picture of this look from Zang’s runway in 2008. Click here to see.
Monday, January 16, 2012
I don’t love the high price of gold, but I just can’t quit that metal. It’s a beautiful color, of course, but it also malleable and resistant to tarnish and corrosion. That makes it good for complicated mechanical jewelry (as well dentistry).
As I’ve said before, my signature Wendy Brandes jewelry line is inspired by the timelessness of antique gold jewelry. I was reminded of this by a photo of a gold and emerald ring found this June in the 1622 wreck of a Spanish treasure ship.
Photo from Mel Fisher's Treasures, via the Wall Street Journal. Click for source.
You could wear that ring now and it would look totally appropriate and beautiful. Make sure your insurance is in order, though, because it was appraised at $1.2 million, according to the Wall Street Journal. Worth every penny, I’d say.
The wreck of the ship, the Nuestra Senora de Atocha, was discovered in 1985 by deep-sea diver Mel Fisher and his team, which has been extracting gold and silver ever since. A few pieces of the salvaged treasure will be auctioned on January 25 by Freeman’s. Alas, the ring is not in the catalog, so if you’ve got $1.2 million burning a hole in your pocket, you’ll have to spend it on my jewelry instead.
Sunday, January 15, 2012
I’m giving my newly invented Best Dressed/Wear What You Want combo award for the Golden Globes red carpet to Piper Perabo. The oversize skirt made her sheer ballgown from Theyskens’ Theory Spring 2012 collection fit for a queen.
Getty Images via Zimbio. Click for source and many more photos.
This is the kind of red-carpet dressing I like. Beautiful, risky and totally memorable. Designer Olivier Theyskens’ work is made for the red carpet — which is appropriate because the red carpet made his career when he designed Madonna’s 1998 Oscar dress.
Madonna's Theyskens dress. Click for source.
Quite a few of his piece since then have had a lasting impact on me, including his “birds” gown for Rochas in 2006 …
Via style.com. Click for source.
… and his chartreuse ombre for Nina Ricci in 2007. (Theyskens goes through jobs like I go through Cadbury Dairy Milk bars.)
Via style.com. Click for source.
Piper’s dress is so spectacular that I forgive her muddy-looking makeup and strange facial expressions. If I were wearing such a majestic dress, maybe I’d say “fuck it” to all the other elements too.
Her dress was certainly the only one of the many pale dresses that stood out. The vast number of blush, pale pink, and other barely-there colors reminded me of the cement color that dominated the Oscar red carpet in 2010. Dull, dull, dull. If I were there, I would much rather be wearing Sarah Michelle Gellar’s monstrous tie-dyed Monique Lhuillier gown than blending in with the boring crowd. Speaking from personal experience, it’s more fun to wind up on the worst-dressed list than be overlooked. Welcome to my world, Sarah Michelle!
I bet I've reposted this picture 100 times. Click to see more pix of my leopard dress.
Speaking of bad, why is Kelly Osbourne a part of E!’s Fashion Police? I didn’t see her walk the red carpet, but when she was sitting down, all the focus was on her lavender-ish hair and cartoonish forearm tattoos and all I could think was, “Poor thing! A purple Care Bear threw up on her!” Her look wasn’t interestingly confrontational or personality-driven in a Wear What You Want style icon way. It was just … stuffed animal. What would Joan Rivers say?
