Jewelry Making

You may just want to join the Naughty Secretary Club, but not because there’s anything particular naughty about it! I always maintain that a catchy or unusual name for a DIY jewelry company can make all the difference in the world and this is a good example.

Not that they’re hiding at all behind their slightly flamboyant name. Jennifer Perkins from NSC (as we shall abbreviate hereafter for this review), creates funky jewelry that emphasizes one of my favorite aspects about DIY jewelry making - reused and renewed items from the past. Along with her mom and sister, she has created a myriad of unique necklaces, bracelets, earrings and brooches that are very colorful and creative. She also features a large selection of non-jewelry items that are just as cool including home accessoires, purses, and fashion accessories like hair clips and belt buckles.

NSC has three basic lines for each jewelry category which include Revamped Vintage (creative pieces made from older, antique jewelry bits), Nostalgic Notions (older antique jewelry stock that have not been worn or used before) and Nouveau (tasteful newer reproductions of vintage costume jewelry).

In particular, I was drawn to what Jennifer calls her “Revamped Vintage” line. I’ll let her explain exactly what that is. From her site:

Revamped vintage is my passion. I LOVE antique costume jewelry and collect oodles of it. I started to run across gorgeous pieces of jewelry that had been broken or perhaps just one earring that had lost it’s mate. Why let these gems go to waste when I could revamp them and combine pieces to make an all new hand made one of a kind piece of jewelry. Miriam Haskell watch out!

As I’ve said before, I’m a huge fan of jewelry boutiques that focus on recycling older pieces… I picked a few Revamped Vintage rings to show here.

From left to right, you have an unusual “Voodoo Scotty” Ring, which is a fun doggie head placed on a red cream antique celluloid button, the classy “Victoria” Ring which features Victorian pattern cabochons accented with red, black and gold paint, and a “Ring Pop” which is a playful hamburger-like layering of a yellow 50’s game chip, a turquoise cabochon and an acrylic maroon dollop of a button on top.

These are really fun pieces, but please note that they are all either one of a kind pieces or extremely limited. Apparently the word is already out on NSC because looking at their press, they are mentioned in tons and tons of publications including The New York Times, Cosmo Girl, Daily News, Lucky, Teen Vogue, Elle Girl… too many to list here!

The Naughty Secretary Club site is available at: www.naughtysecretaryclub.com