Alex and Ani sent me a Tree of Life Expandable Wire Bangle. This bracelet benefits the ARC -African Rainforest Conservatory.

The bracelet is lovely – a delicate expandable wire, with a Tree of Life Charm. The bracelet fit both my wrist and my daughter’s slimmer wrist. It really is easily expandable, but what I liked best about the bracelet was the look of the gold wire. It has a sort of aged look to it – shiny, but also like a well-loved piece.

Here’s Part Two of my interview.
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Pretty By Nature: I really respect what you are doing with your charities, both the Tree of Life Bangle program and Project USA. Would you please tell the readers a little bit about what you’ve been able to accomplish with these charities?  
Carolyn Rafaelian: We’ve partnered with several charities and are thrilled we have the ability to help foundations in need. We came up with our Charity by Design concept so we create specific pieces and collections catered to each organization with proceeds of sales donated to these foundations. Foundations that we have partnered with and donated to have included Stand up to Cancer, The Humane society, Red Cross and African Rainforest Conservancy to name a few. Charity by Design is the heart and soul of Alex and Ani, and it continues to grow.

Image Credit: Michelle Smith

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The pieces have a bohemian charm to them (my favorite kind of charm), reminding me of a sort of Esmeralda gypsy-chic with lots of bangles, beads, and feathers. Many of the pieces are made of recycled or vintage materials. Rafaelian has developed an expandable wire bangle that adjusts to fit any wrist. I’ve tried it and it easily adjusted between my wrist and my daughter’s much slimmer arm.

Halo OM Necklace  
$98

Zebra Stripe Feather Earrings
$78

Peace Expandable Wire Bangle Set
$108

I had the opportunity to interview Carolyn Rafaelian. Today, I’ve got Part One of the interview for you. Please come back tomorrow for Part Two of ourAlex and Ani interview.
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Pretty By Nature: How did you become a jewelry designer?   Has jewelry design always been your passion? 
Carolyn Rafaelian: My father opened our factory in 1966, so I literally grew up in the jewelry industry. I spent many summers helping my father and started to create my own pieces and design at a very early age.  However, it wasn’t until my two daughters, Alex and Ani, were born when I decided I wanted to leave a legacy for them and branched off to start my own jewelry company. It was my destiny to become a jewelry designer. 
 

PBN: I love the idea of expandable jewelry. Women come in all shapes and sizes and by making your jewelry expandable, you’ve made sure that everyone can enjoy it. How did you develop the expandable feature?
CR: My showroom is in New York, so I spend a lot of time traveling back and forth from New York to Rhode Island. The expandable idea started during one of my trips (where I am alone to brainstorm and come up with new ideas) I was thinking about my endless hoop design and how it would be great as a bangle, to expand and fit everyone. I love that women come in all shapes and sizes, so I created these bangles with women in mind. 
 

PBN: Where do you find the recycled materials that are used in your designs?  The feathered earrings are gorgeous. Where did you find the feathers?
CR: A lot of the material that we use to make Alex and Ani bracelets and jewelry are recycled and vintage. Local mills in Rhode Island provide us with the recycled metals that are used for the bangles and the other metal pieces. Our feathers come from a local distributor and are gathered after naturally falling off the birds. We always make sure that consumers are aware that no birds are harmed in this process. All of our products are made in the USA, which holds higher environmental standards compared to other countries.

Image credit: Alex and Ani

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PBN: The piece with the red glass…how do you go about designing a piece?

Kyra Crilly: Red sea glass is the rarest of them all. There is much speculation where red glass comes from, as commercial red glass is not produced much anymore. A red piece is found only once in five thousand pieces – and the thought is that it came from either ships signal lights or old vintage car lights (modern day car lights are made of plastic). Some sea glass collectors can go an entire lifetime without finding a red piece.

When I sit down to design a piece of jewelry, I first carefully inspect the sea glass I am about to use – I look at its shape, colour and any markings it may have.  The irregular pitting or ‘patina’ is made from nature – being tossed in the tides amongst the pebbles and rocks, which can’t be duplicated by a rock tumbler or hand sanding.

I try to highlight the beauty of each piece by using adornments such as pearls and filigree which have an element of nature and an ‘antiqued’ feeling about it.

Since sea glass is vintage, with each piece being at least decades old in age -  I naturally veered toward a vintage, Victorian style in my designs. I guess I’m just a romantic at heart.

And I love the fact that sea glass is eco-friendly – I wanted to show people that recycled jewelry doesn’t have to be expensive or utilitarian. I also love taking on custom designs, especially if someone has found their own sea glass pieces that they would like to use – as it’s the beach combing process that makes these gems so special.
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Thanks Kyra. I have really enjoyed learning about your process and I hope that the readers have enjoyed it, as well.

Image credit: GhostShipat Etsy.com

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Kyra is new to the glass and has only been operating her shop for a couple of months. She wrote a piece about working with the glass, called The Art and Meditation of Drilling Sea Glassthat you can read at Etsy.  Please look at a few examples of her work below and then read Part One of her interview. I’ll share Part Two, along with agorgeous commissioned piece of Kyra’s work with you tomorrow.

Fisherman’s Treasure
$27.00

Lobster Trap
$27.00

Ice Caps
$18.00

PBN: How did you get started with the sea glass?

Kyra: At work one day a few months ago, a colleague showed me a beautiful sea glass bracelet she had made for herself. I had never seen sea glass before, and I immediately fell in love with the frosty gems. Shortly thereafter, I had some kind of epiphany of wanting to start my own jewelry line, and GhostShip was immediately born.

I started to collect sea glass from my local beach, and was amazed that I had never noticed these found treasures before. Before I knew it, I had beach combed some really rare pieces – pieces from vintage blue coke bottles, beautiful opaque vintage milk glass and even those that came from Depression glass in the 1930’s.

I loved the history behind each piece, and the romance and mystery of wondering where they came from and who used it and for what purpose – an old apothecary jar, a filigree perfume bottle stopper, an ornate vase that may have sat in someones dining room table in the last century.

I was so inspired that literally within a month’s time, I designed the entire GhostShip line and opened up my shop on Etsy.
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Thank you, Kyra! Check back tomorrow for Part Two of Kyra’s interview.

Image credit: GhostShipshop at Etsy.com

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