Are your gems joyful enough?
Move over millennials, jewellery making grandmother Roxanne Assoulin is the new Instagram brand sensation, finds Caroline Leaper
At the age of 63, Roxanne Assoulin has become New York’s new jewellery designer to watch. Having spent almost 40 years beavering away behind the scenes at some of the city’s biggest fashion and accessories houses, the grandmother of six admits that the irony of the accolade isn’t lost on her.
“That’s fashion,” she laughs. “If someone had told me when I was 50 that I was going to start my own line in my sixties I would have never believed them. But age has been surprisingly helpful at making me think, ‘Why not, what’s the worst that can happen?’”
Assoulin’s colour-blocked crystal and enamel jewellery has gained a cult following since she made her first prototypes in 2016. Her collections boast a winning combination of collectability (stack ’em high for a bold effect), Instagram-ability (they pop up best with the Clarendon filter on) and affordability, with the Rainbow Brite bracelets
(£155 for three) and mismatched Hip-hop
But Not earrings (£90) among the bestsellers to date. The designer herself primarily wears black clothes. She says that bright accessories have always provided the feelgood factor for her when getting dressed, and she had a feeling that other women might agree on a similar styling approach.
“For 30 years I had this pile of enamel tiles on my desk that I would play with, and one day I put them together on a bracelet stack,” she explains. “I called a few young people, like Leandra [Medine, a fashion blogger], who is friends with my children, to see if it meant anything to them. Leandra said it was ‘everything’ and that Instagram was the place for it. They gave me the confidence to do it; I was thinking, ‘I don’t even know how to use a computer and here I am starting an e-commerce business.’”
Assoulin’s career began in New York in 1978 when she made hair accessories for Fiorucci clients to wear on nights out at
Studio 54. In the Eighties, she turned her attention to costume jewellery, developing runway pieces for Oscar de la Renta, then Marc Jacobs. “With Marc back in the day, I did his [1992] grunge collection for Perry Ellis,” she remembers. “He was one of the most talented kids around and amazing to work with; I did chokers and charms, rings and belts, too. He always challenged me. It’s fun working with creatives, as they torture you but they push you to come up with incredible things.”
In 2008, Assoulin started her own commercial design company, hiring a team of 25 to work with her on jewellery styles for clients from J Crew to Urban Outfitters. “It was a really comfortable business, but now that world is changing,” she admits. “The established bricks and mortar stores are not as stable as they were, and a lot of small internet brands are thriving. I didn’t necessarily know how I was going to launch into the e-commerce thing, but I understood that was what I should start doing next.”
Another thing that Assoulin says confirmed she should change tack was watching her daughter-in-law, Rosie Assoulin, successfully launch her own ready-to-wear line in 2013.
“I made jewellery for Rosie’s [runway] presentations for the first couple of years when she launched and it was great,” she explains. “I saw her doing so well and it gave me a little bit of courage. I was always afraid to take my own ideas and see them be rejected. It was, of course, safer to work under other people, but you can never know unless you try.”
Communicating the fun of jewellery making to grown-ups is of vital importance to Assoulin. She hosts friendship bracelet-making parties, where clients are presented with sweetie trays of glossy tiles and gems and are encouraged to build their own look. The experience is creative, nostalgic and infectious – they’re calling it the new pottery making among the West Village’s slow hobbies set (crocheting, basket weaving, or Japanese flower arranging, anyone?).
“I didn’t intend for any of this when I started,” Assoulin insists. “I just liked pretty colours and wanted to put something together. But people associate the brand with feeling happy. It’s mood-altering and I want everyone to enjoy it.”