Oye Modern - Unique, short-run jewellery with impact

August 31st, 2010, by Jeni Oye

An impromtu fashion shoot

Last weekend was a bit of a girls weekend. My cousin Lisa was up from Melbourne, and on Saturday night my sister Claire and her friend Serena came over for dinner.

Serena was after some new earrings so we started raiding the jewellery boxes… Many pieces were tried on so I grabbed Phil (husband and resident Oye Modern photographer), and we started shooting the action. It just so happens there is a nice white wall in the kitchen that is a perfect backdrop. Little did we know at the time, how photogenic Serena was. Check out some of these amazing shots that are now up on our product pages.

These photos should help our customers understand the scale of the jewellery, how it falls and how it looks on, all very important considerations when buying jewelery. We’re considering another evening of good wine and friends to see what else we can produce.

Not bad for a spur-of-the-moment photo shoot, don’t you think?

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August 26th, 2010, by Jeni Oye

Student jewellery at Young Blood Design Markets

The 2010 Young Blood Designer Markets held at the Powerhouse Museum were great, especially since it was combined with the designboom mart, making the whole event bigger and better and more interesting.

The highlight for me, of course, was the work of the students from Sydney’s two dominant jewellery schools, Design Centre Enmore and Sydney College of the Arts (SCA). Each school had a stall where a selection of their designers could offer their works for sale. Have a look at some of the cool stuff I found.

These beautifully colourful brooches are by Corinne Snare. They’re made of paper and silver and are super cool. Below are some more designs by Corinne that incorporate a similar use of the paper, but more as a highlight and less as a central part of the design, also really interesting.

These fun Slinky Pins are the latest product from Enmore’s Jewellery + Object Design Production Initiative. Designed by Rachael Beswick, they were launched at Young Blood this year. Love the fluorescent colours!

I found these pendants by Kenny Son really bold and interesting. Very unique.

And here’s a little more Wow factor, these necklaces are made from hand dyed cable ties by Carol Faulkner. Aren’t they fantastic! Upon further investigation, I discovered that Carol had created this dress completely made of cable ties, crazy!

The dress won The Design Institute of Australia’s Overall Winner of the Australasian Student Design Awards 2010. It was selected from the 9 category winners and over 140 entries to take the top spot of Overall Winner. Congratulations Carol.

And finally, below are the works of a few more Enmore graduates on display at the markets.

Congratulations to all the students and graduates that displayed at the markets, I hope you made some great sales!  Looking forward to next year’s stalls.

Did you go to the markets? What did you think?

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August 18th, 2010, by Jeni Oye

Jewellery hunting at designboom Sydney

Off I went on Sunday, excited and curious to see what designboom had in store this year. It was held at the Powerhouse Museum in conjunction with the annual Young Blood Designers Market – blog post on that to come next.

There were 23 young avant-garde designers, including a good number of jewellers, so I was in my element. The most colourful and eye-catching stall was, of course, our long-standing favourite, in-sync design.

With their fun brooches and super cool earrings, it’d be hard to walk by without stopping. But even better, behind the counter, Iris gave me a sneak peak at some exciting new designs coming in the next month or so. Stay tuned for a new selection of really fun pieces from in-sync design.

The most interesting, and surprising, part of designboom was the number of designers from Thailand. I hadn’t seen any contemporary jewellery from that part of the world and it was a definite treat.

This is Joy, from todesire studio jewelry, Thailand. Her and her business partner Tod make some wonderful jewellery that really caught my attention.

And then next to todesire was Saprang, also from Thailand. Their signature designs were extravagant, bold, and wonderfully large pieces made from brass.

The flower designs were fantastic, and this ring was simply amazing, the petals on the ring are held together at the center, so as you move, the whole ring moves with you—stunning! A definite conversation starter for sure.

I really enjoyed designboom this time around and would recommend it to anyone looking for some truly unique work from up and coming designers. Stay tuned for the jewellery I discovered at Youngblood, coming next.

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August 16th, 2010, by Jeni Oye

Announcing the winners of our competition

Thanks to everyone who submitted photos for our Strut Your Stuff competition! Check out all the wonderful photos submitted here in our Gallery.

… … drum roll please … … !

Winner of the Popular Vote

The winner of the Popular Vote, with 24 votes is Jeanne-Marie Neihaus with a gorgeous photo of herself wearing the Whimsy Ring by Kristina Brenke.

How gorgeous is this photo? I think it’s just spectacular. Absolutley deserving of a $150 gift voucher. Congratulations Jeanne-Marié!

Winner of the Staff Pick

The winner of the Staff Pick is Candace and Ashtan’s wonderfully creative photo of Ashtan wearing the Pencil Shaving necklace by Victoria Mason.

Ashtan: “I got this necklace from my parents for my 16th birthday and have put it on everyday since then! I love it!”

What a fantastic photo, it looks like you had some fun creating the setting for it too! Candace, Ashtan’s mum says:

“I was once a professional children’s photographer who’s business closed due to the economy. The stress of it all, I fell out of love with my camera. So, it’s funny how this little competition, an awesome necklace design… and a daughter who loves Oye Modern inspired me to dust off the camera and have some fun! So, I should thank you for inspiring me to have a fun photography day with my 3 kids….out in my garage!”

There’s certainly no doubt this photo is deserving of a $150 gift voucher. Congratulations Candace and Ashtan!

The runners-up

It wasn’t easy to select the winning photo, here are a few of the photos that got close!

A setting close to my heart, Times Square in NYC is right by the Diamond District, where I spent a lot of my own time and money purchasing supplies for my jewellery hobby a few years ago.

LOVE the “Pick me!” message on the Blackboard brooch, very clever. And the setting at Maroubra Beach (Sydney, Australia) makes me want to be there right now!

And I love the colours in this photo, so rich and vibrant. Love it!

Thanks again everyone for your entries. Watch out for our next competition, coming soon!

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August 15th, 2010, by Jeni Oye

Jewellery by Maricha Genovese

Just discovered some amazing jewellery by Maricha Genovese, who is based in the USA. She has some really unique and interesting designs combining sterling silver, wool and CZ.

What do you think, do you like them?

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August 13th, 2010, by Aprill Allen

Ring Pop Art

“Jewellery as art” takes on new meaning with Julia Chiang’s recent Ring Pop art exhibits. Brooklyn-based Julia is a sculptor and earlier this year she created this fabulous Ring Pop installation for Miami’s OhWow gallery. Her sweet words are subjected to the heat from gallery lighting and over time they melt, creating trails of sticky ooze that collect on the floor. I love these images. Apart from being fun and colourful, they remind me of being a kid and spending a dollar at the corner store on a bag of mixed lollies.

Via from TrendLand, StreetRat and Apartment Therapy.

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July 25th, 2010, by Jeni Oye

An interview with Andrea Corson

Andrea Corson lives, breathes, and eats her art. Well, not so much eats, but she’s thoroughly immersed in her creative life. Her designs are exciting and so breath-taking that we just had to know more about her artistic process and lifestyle. She graciously agreed to be interviewed by us and we’re delighted to be able to share it with you.

When we first saw Andrea’s designs it seemed a natural progression for her to have moved from sculpture to jewellery making, but we found out it was her interest in jewellery that came first. She learned the techniques in high school and college, but sculpture came to the fore for Andrea at university, graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Sculpture from Syracuse University and then an MFA in Sculpture from Cranbrook Academy of Art.

Oye Modern: What made you return to jewellery design?

Andrea: Several years after graduate school, I began to play with jewelry again. I did not stop making sculpture and drawings, but I was curious about shifting my focus on the ideas of the function of an art object. Sculpting wearable pieces seemed to make sense for me.

Oye Modern: Tell us a little about your creative process

Andrea: I try to take a fresh and innovative approach to making jewelry. I will sketch ideas once in a while, but prefer to write about my ideas in my journal, and/or I just sit down and make what I am envisioning. My creative process, whether planned or intuitive, can be quite labor intensive and includes a lot of experimentation. I work alongside my collections of everyday recognizable shapes and symbols, toys and curious objects. Their detail and colors are very inspirational, and the objects are often included in my work. I hand drip all the balls of the caviars styles, and each link of every chain is individually made. I do love to work from scratch. Using only a few basic wax-working tools, my hands, wax and other materials, I sculpt until an idea and form is translated.

Oye Modern: What are you working on this week?

Andrea: This week I am working on new caviars styles, a ‘puffy’ hearts cuff, and ‘puffy’ stars earrings I am also hand finishing a new silver chain that reminds me of berries on a tree with the feeling of a tassel, and a new natural rock inspired ring. These pieces will be in an exhibit coming up this July, in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Oye Modern: Can you tell us a little about where you live and work, and how that has influenced your jewellery?

Andrea: My fiancé, Christopher Yockey, is a sculptor and an assistant to a world-renowned artist. We live at the artist’s studio, where Chris also has his own workspace. The studio is on a pier on the east river guarded by 5 rambunctious dogs. It is a unique community of creative minds, neighboring Socrates Sculpture Park. The view of Manhattan and the sunsets are fabulous.

NYC is endless and full of surprises ­– never a dull moment. I like having many resources within reach, and there is so much creativity and diversity here within my friends, fashion, galleries, museums, architecture, restaurants, and so much more. I also love my daily street run, a day at a botanical garden and playing tennis in Central Park.

Oye Modern: Wow, we love Christopher’s sculpture, and huge congratulations on your recent engagement, we’re so thrilled for you! When we met in New York in June, I was blown away by the awesomeness of your engagement ring. Can you tell us a little about it?

Andrea: In 1997, my mother died of cancer. I inherited her jewelry, including her engagement ring. The stone is beautiful and the setting unique to the 1950s. My mother’s ring carries 39 years of her wear and history. I wanted to keep memories alive by keeping her ring intact, and I wanted to turn the ring into something contemporary and very, very my style. I created a baroque-like casing for my mother’s ring to sit into. The casing enhances her engagement ring that has now become mine.

Huge thanks to Andrea for sharing all this with us, we can’t wait to see what you’ll come up with next!

Here’s a taste of some of Andrea’s work available at Oye Modern. Get some for yourself!

Shop Andrea Corson at Oye Modern >

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July 4th, 2010, by Jeni Oye

Sylvie doubles as a hand model

Sylvie didn’t realise that when she signed up to work with us in a customer service role, that being a hand model was part of the job description. To be honest we didn’t either, but when we started talking about finding a friend with beautiful hands to showcase our rings and bracelets, we discovered we didn’t need to look very far.

We’ve been wanting to do some proper on-body photography for a long time. Being able to see the jewellery on a person really helps understand scale and how it looks when worn.

Although you see it everyday in the glossy fashion magazines, shooting jewellery on people is not as easy as you might think, especially for a small business like ours. It involves finding a model that is representative of our customers and our brand, styling their makeup, hair and outfit(s), finding an appropriate setting (indoor/outdoor), and having all the camera and lighting equipment to make it all come together.

So we thought we’d start small. Phil is our resident product photographer, and with our current setup we discovered we could shoot some rings and bracelets on a hand pretty easily.

Here’s a few of my favourite shots:

Beautiful don’t you think?

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July 4th, 2010, by Jeni Oye

Welcome to the Oye Modern blog

Aaaaand we’re up and running! We’ve talked about getting this blog started for about 2 years now, and now here we are.

We plan to bring you lots of cool stuff, such as interviews with our designers, a peak into Oye Modern behind-the-scenes, news and event info and anything else you tell us you want to hear about.

We’ll have a few contributors, here’s a little about each of us.

What kinds of things would you like us to post here?

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