What's All This Then?

At this point, it is quite likely you are asking yourself, "Hunter, what's going on here?  What is all this stuff?  Where did y'all come from?  If I hiccup and sneeze at the same time, will I go blind?"

For starters, it's a bit presumptuous to be using my first name all willy-nilly right off the bat.  I mean, we barely know each other.  At least buy me dinner first.

Second, those were all good questions, even the sneezing one, because if you've never wondered about that, have you really even lived at all?

Being a sucker for a linear interpretation of the space/time continuum, beginning at the beginning seems like a capital idea.  Back in the 80's, Andrea was toiling away as an interior decorator, both to put food on the table as well as (and most importantly) keep me covered up in Star Wars action figures.  She discovered during that time that decorating meant a lot more than showing people carpet swatches and picking out armoires, it was also dealing with recalcitrant house painters, unscrupulous and downright handsy contractors and becoming an amateur marriage counselor.

But when she wasn't busy convincing a couple that a backsplash was definitely NOT grounds for divorce, as a hobby she made jewelry.  She started the way every jewelry hobbyist does, a beading board, some thread, some cool stones and pendants she found here and there, and then she would proudly wear her creation to the many "oohs" and "ahhs" of her friends.  If she had enough materials, she'd make one for them as well or give them as gifts after specially tailoring a design to a particular friend or loved one, and slowly but surely people outside her immediate circle of friends began to admire her creations and on occasion, actual strangers would call and request one.

However, as few and far between as those were, one could hardly make a living doing it and so she kept braving the war zone of decorating, all the while scouring flea markets, estate sales and antique stores for more unique items to craft necklaces or bracelets or earrings out of.

One day, while at one of those aforementioned flea markets, Andi happened upon the booth of an older gentleman who had a variety of odds and ends, but in particular, a weathered box under one of his tables that was filled with antique Sterling Victorian hair brushes.  Most of the brushes in the box were exactly as one might imagine a Victorian hair brush should appear, except for one, which lacked a handle, but rather was more of a florid rectangle of silver, a clutch of bedraggled bristles clinging for life to its underside.

At that moment inspiration struck and Andrea wondered, "If I remove the rest of these bristles, I wonder if I can solder a keep onto this and make it into a belt buckle?"  Turns out...she could.  She proudly wore her new "recycled" buckle and received one compliment after another from friends as well as strangers, and eventually one request after another for one of their own.

Thus she had to figure out if it could be duplicated.  Clearly, massaging flea markets and antique stores for suitable brushes/buckles wouldn't be feasible, so creating a mold and casting it seemed the only solution.  After finding a good caster and getting a clean mold, the first Sterling reproduction of her buckle arrived and it was perfect.  She sold those first five within a few days and had to order more, and next thing she knew, a dozen, then two dozen, then three were flying out the door every week.  She was now selling to actual boutiques, and not just locally, but in San Antonio and Austin and Kerrville and Tulsa and Houston and of course, back in her hometown of Beaumont.   She soon knew the UPS man by name and when her friend Susan asked her to do a trunk show at her shop in Dallas's swanky Snider Plaza, she realized she had fallen bass-ackwards into an actual business. 

Soon she had "liberated" many other items from the shackles of their previous lives...Victorian dance card covers, make-up jar lids, clothes brushes, whiskey labels, matchboxes, drawer escutcheons, and many others became buckles and bracelets and pins and pendants.  Antique cufflinks became earrings, ancient keys became pendants and Victorian napkin rings were reborn as cuff bracelets...and then there were the crosses, s-o-o-o-o many crosses which...well, they stayed crosses because...you know, what else would you even turn that into and could it possibly be cool enough to risk Divine fury?

No.  The answer to that is "no".  I shouldn't have to tell you that.

Andrea had collected religious iconography for most of her adult life, especially Spanish colonial retablos, folk art shrines and an endless variety of French crosses, and so incorporating those into the line was entirely natural.  Not the retablos or shrines because, while "big" jewelry was certainly "in" at that time, not like mailbox big, you know?  That's just silly.  

Along with the crosses, Andi had collected old Sterling Victorian hearts that used to be worn on charm bracelets (again, hearts were a "thing" in the '80's) and once made a double stranded necklace out of about 150 of them that albeit heavy as a van full of anvils, was pretty danged fabulous if you ask me, which you didn't. 

Things progressed, she moved her home office into an office office, which is a term I'm pretty sure I just made up, and business boomed.  But fashion is an elusive, ever-moving target and it changes upon a whim, so when low-rise jeans suddenly became the rage, big Sterling belt buckles fell out of favor...because that would look super weird on hip-huggers to just have a large silver buckle and belt around your bare-skinned waist likes some sort of lunatic.  So, Andrea had to evolve...

And evolve she did, into gemstone based jewelry, with intricate wire-work and wild varieties of pearls and thing-a-ma-jigs and doo-hickeys and yes I am making that up because it was before my time.

The line has evolved a number of times over the last 30 years, and on this site you will find examples from each era, including our latest incarnation which is dominated by religious medals.

And if you want to see some of our latest designs, we have an information page that will hopefully guide you to one of the many boutiques around the country that carry our line. 

Thanks for visiting us and I hope your eyes aren't swollen shut from reading this!