My One Month Anniversary!

Hi everyone--sorry it's been so long since I have written! I was busy having my 28th birthday (I am officially old?) and making more jewelry, like usual!

I have actually been making lots and lots of gold things lately, which is pretty unusual for me. Most people who know me know that I wear mostly silver. I don't know how or why I developed such a strong preference, but for the majority of my life I have worn silver jewelry almost exclusively. That only started to change recently, since I started my jewelry company. First, I started to notice the gold chain in supply stores. Then I started to think how beautiful gold would look with certain gemstones. And somehow, over the past six months or so, I have really started to get into gold. I wrote a blog post about this last fall, after I made my first pair of gold earrings. But now, I actually wear gold myself! One day last week, I wore only gold jewelry--and I liked it! Above, you can see a few of my latest gold creations. The only one that made it to Etsy is the middle necklace--it is named after my awesome cousin Jamie, and you can find it HERE. I think I have already sold the other two....it's so hard to keep track of everything that's online versus what is in my physical store, and figuring what to put where!

Speaking of my store, it has now been open officially for four weeks! It will be one month this coming Sunday. Crazy. Sometimes it feels like this month has passed in the blink of an eye, and other times it feels like the store has been open for years. Either way, it is going well and I will officially be there for at least one more month! If you find yourself in NYC, you should come say hi. The website is finally up too, so you should check that out HERE. I think 12 Lions is a great name for a store. I never realized where the name came from--there are 12 lion gargoyles holding up the roof of the building. I am totally going to write a blog post about that and put up pictures one day soon--there are some great photos of the lions online.

I will finish this blog post with a photograph of the lovely Kristina Hyrri modeling one of my watches! She is a super sweet girl from Finland who came by my booth at 12 Lions last week and shared delicious Finnish candies with me and bought two watches. I am glad the watches have gone to a good home, and a big thank you to Kristina for coming to my store and for being so sweet!

Hope everyone has a great week, and come visit me and the 12 lions sometime! xo

My jewelry booth is open!

I am excited to announce that my new jewelry booth is now open! There's an article about the new store here, featuring a really nice picture of me wearing jewelry from my collection. Come see the booth in person at 12 Lion Studio - the address is 684 Broadway, at the corner of Great Jones. We will be open 11-8, Thursday through Sunday. Today was the first day, and it went really well. I am looking forward to many more days of fun and hopefully of many sales!

Jewelry Booth Set-Up, Day 2!

I just got home from another long day of setting up my jewelry booth at The Event NoHo. It looks a little messy in the picture, but it is really starting to come together and feel like a real store. A very tiny store! The only thing that is noticeably missing is, of course, my jewelry. But that will be remedied tomorrow. I can't believe we are opening in less than two days! I am starting to get very excited...

Jewelry Booth Installation, Day #1

For those of you who don't know, I am opening a brand new jewelry booth this coming Thursday! I will be one of about 20 different vendors at a brand new designers' market opening on the corner of Broadway and Great Jones St. here in NYC. There is going to be a nice range of products, from jewelry and handbags to clothes and skin care products. And more. I finally started meeting some of the other vendors today, and everybody so far is very, very nice. Thank God, because we will all be spending a lot of time together in the days and weeks ahead! I can't wait to meet everybody else as the week goes on. As you can see, I have made some progress on what was originally a plain white booth. The walls have now been painted green, which I really love. The color looks a little drab in the picture, but in person it feels very bright and natural, which is exactly what I was going for. You can also see an upside down clock off to the left, which I will be turning into a jewelry display. It's hard to get a good sense of everything that will be happening in the next two days, but I figured I should post a first picture today so we can compare my progress later this week! Truth be told, I don't even fully understand what the design will look like yet. But that is half the fun!

So much Etsy competition!

I always knew there was a lot of competition among jewelry artists on Etsy--it is, after all, the biggest and most well established venue online for handmade jewelry. But just looking at these stats really put it into perspective for me just how many fellow artisans there really are. All of us, of course, vying for the same clientele. No wonder I'm not making that many sales!

Finding a way to stand out online feels a little bit impossible sometimes, but this goes to show just how important it is. I know I have not yet hit my Etsy stride, but I do think it's possible. I really do believe there is potential for making a decent amount of sales, or at least much greater potential than what I'm currently doing. Seeing this information is certainly very helpful, if slightly depressing!

All of these stats are courtesy to Pearl Blay over at The Beading Gem's Journal, and you can find her original blog post here. And now I am off to make more jewelry--can't believe I start moving into my new jewelry booth tomorrow! Where, hopefully, I will stand out very much.

The contract is signed!

It's official--I will be opening my jewelry booth next Thursday at the brand new designers market, The Event NoHo!! It's right on the corner of Broadway and Great Jones... I can't wait to post pictures of the booth and how the whole space looks totally finished and filled with designers! I am so scared and so excited, and I also just can't wait! There are so many unknowns, because the space is brand new, but also so much possibility. A lot will be happening in the next six days! More to come very soon....

New jewelry booth update!

I can't believe I am opening my new jewelry booth on Broadway next week!!! I went by the space today to take some exact measurements and check out all the work that has been going on. You can see that the ceiling has been painted black and brand new lighting has been installed. I think it looks great! The partitions between booths are built now too--you can see me standing inside my booth-to-be below. It's only about 7' x 5', and yet there is so much to do to transform that little box into an awesome jewelry booth! I can't believe that this time next week everything will be painted and starting to be filled with my jewelry! I can't wait to see how it turns out. There are still so many decisions to make about design. I want to ensure that my jewelry and I stand out among the 20 or so other vendors who will be in the space.

Standing there today with Nick, I started to feel overwhelmed with all there is to do. It's not like I can just focus on the design of the booth all week--I still have to keep designing and making jewelry, and working on the business side of things too (creating inventory sheets and price lists, etc). It's a lot for one brain to do. Also, I have a pretty strong streak of perfectionism, which means I don't want my booth, or my jewelry, to just be good, I want it to be THE BEST! Which probably means I am putting a little too much pressure on myself. I'm not an expert, and there's nothing to be gained by stressing myself out more than I need to. No matter what, I'm sure that my booth will turn out just fine. Between me and Nick, I'm sure it will be more than fine. And I will be okay with that!

There are just so many things still to decide on! What color will I paint the walls? What fabric will I hang below the shelves? How many shelves will there be? What will my sign be? Where will I hang it? How will the displays look? How much jewelry will I put out? And so on! I will post more pictures soon as this starts to come together....next Thursday 3/15 is opening day! Yikes!