Rustic Elegance

  I thought it only fit to write my first post back from NYC about old friend and New York-based jewellery designer Vanessa Lianne. I was introduced to Vanessa by her sister and one of my very oldest and closest friends, Lara, circa 1992, when I was a mere 5 years old. 
   There are no better words to describe the designers work than both rustic and elegant. Vanessa intertwines timeless design components with edgier, rawer, new-age jewellery ideas. She generates pieces that are intricate yet simple, feminine yet uncommon, worked yet seemingly au natural. 
   Trained as a gold smith, everything this innovative designer creates is hand forged, hammered, and soldered in her funky east village studio with her own two hands. Yes, that's right. The links that make up her bracelets? She puts those together, piece by piece. 
   The laborious hours, hard work, and immense concentration it takes this incredibly creative creature to produce a single piece of work is astonishing- but her art is truly a labour of love, and inspiring to the chic science geeks at JOTN. 
    As a laid-back westcoaster with a hunger to create, and a talent for building wearable art, she picked up her life and immersed herself into the fast-paced, cut throat streets of New York. Vanessa has persevered through the years of tough love from the industry and extreme hard work behind the gold smith bench. She is beginning to get the recognition she so rightly deserves, and ultimately, she has proven that the road less travelled ain't easy, but damn it's worth it. The girl is living her dream day in and day out as she works hard to make it, and makes us beautiful pieces while she's at it!

The ring on the far left = my absolute personal fave. 

I'm asking for it for the holidays. It's made of gold vermeil with black diamonds.

I saw it on the designer's hand the last time we met at Balthazar.

Perfect mix of ying and yang- raw edge with an old classic bobble ring feel. 

 

                     

Absolutely love all these stackable rings. I could even see one in gold or white gold ones as a wedding band!

Square mens band.

architectural, simplistic, perfect. 

Love it for myself.

Some of Vanessa's more androgynous designs are gorgeous, edgy, totally modern and great for anyone. 

Check out HER WEBSITE to learn more about her work, and where you can purchase her stuff online, in Vancouver, and in New York.

Needless to say my trip to the promised land, aka NYC, was perfect. While the weather outside was frightful, the Guggenheim and MoMa were truly delightful, and the shopping wasn't all that bad either (obvz).