Not everyone knows that I spent 12 years being a full time fashion stylist. I worked my way up from a lowly fashion assistant in the Vanity Fair fashion closet to being the Style Editor of Vogue China. What does that have to do with gemstones? Well, it taught me to work hard, how hone in on my personal aesthetics, and it trained my eyes.
I didn’t go to school for fashion styling, I have a BFA in fashion design. Styling wasn’t even a real job when I started in it. It was basically a made up job that I got paid for, at the time at least it was. Back in the early 2000’s, fashion writers did photo shoots and needed help with steaming and organizing cloths. I remember interning in 2002 at WWD & W magazine where the fashion writer told me that a photo shoot has a visual theme throughout a “story” in the magazine. For example, the September issue always has a coats story or a sweater story so each image that was taken had a different coat or sweater in it. Those were the easy days. Fast forward to 2010, being in charge of my own shoots for Vogue China, it was about concepts. For example, the theme is transparency, so each image or look had some sort of transparent element. Fast forward again to 2015, magazines had to follow the rules of their advertisers for survival and the themes became about a feeling. Why a feeling? Because we could not choose to mix and match brands anymore. We had to shoot a brand’s entire look down to the shoes! Stylists had no choice but to pull from the ether to come up with a connecting theme. The only way to tell a visually cohesive story was through this “feeling” you could create with the total looks from each advertising brand. That was when I had to leave fashion. I no longer had creative control over what to mix and match and had no idea what I was feeling or looking at in a fashion shoot.
2015 was the year I launched YI Collection (Collection being in small case letters because I hadn’t grown up yet). It was a leap of faith. It was scary and expensive. I had no idea what I was doing. Now it seems like a dream ago. I had a spark of creativity, which I have no idea where it originated from. I created a double gemstone chain ring during my trip to Myanmar and my friends bought them from my fingers. One of them was the visual merchandiser at 10 Corso Como and that became my first stockist. Moda Operandi became my 2nd stockist. For the first 3 years, this baby jewelry brand was still a hobby because it was nowhere near profitable.
So how does fashion styling connect to gemstones? Well I approach designing the same way I would styling. I try many looks and then edit down to the best ones. The feeling when I know something looks good in jewelry is the same feeling I get when I style a great look. It’s this inside voice that screams YES! Styling gave me the confidence to know when a color combination is interesting and working. That same skill I honed in on for 12 years applies to my jewelry designing. The attention to details, the visual feeling and the final results are all a culmination of over a decade of fine tuning.
In my 10th year in business, I’m still learning, growing and fine tuning. This pivot in my career was the best decision I’ve ever made. This wonderful world of colored gemstones has brought me so much joy and confidence. I don’t have a child but I feel this is my baby girl, 10 years old and mama couldn’t be more proud.