Wendy Brandes Jewelry in the Wild

It’s fun to take photos of jewelry out and about, or “in the wild,” as I like to think of it.

Eryn Patton is great at modeling fistfuls of rings, so she took the rings off my fingers over drinks this week and struck some poses. (Damn, Eryn, back at it again with all the rings!)

The most visible rings, from left: gold “No Class” ring; platinum full-finger ring; yellow diamond NYC Taxi and Passenger Maneater ring.

Eryn was worried about her nail polish being chipped, but I thought it gave her a 1990s Courtney Love vibe. Let’s declare that chipped polish is fashionable again, the way New York Times did in 2008.

Here’s another shot. From left: three barbed wire stacking rings (platinum, 18K rose gold, 18K yellow gold); platinum barbed wire full-finger ring; 18K rose gold crab ring; Eryn’s own ring; Siobhan perma-stacked stacking ring; ruby-eyed skull ring, worn as mid-finger ring, and Eryn’s own ring; my gold college class ring (!!) worn as mid-finger ring, and Eryn’s own ring.

I almost melted down my class ring a couple of years ago, when gold prices peaked. I hadn’t worn that ring in decades. But I spared the ring because I like the signet look, and I knew if I kept it around, signet rings would stay in my mind. It worked! When singer/songwriter Skylar Grey asked me to design a “No Class” class ring for her, I thought, “Signets, yes, I’ve been wanting to do that” and hopped to it. I even made a gold one for myself. Then, while looking through some inventory this week, I came across the college ring again and realized it looks good worn on the same hand as my gold No Class ring. Proximity to something funny makes boring things better!