Botanicals. Fair Trade Flowers Jewelry. You might wonder what inspired Dunitz & Company to create and offer a new collection of affordable earrings and pins with images of flowers. Not just any flowers. But vintage images of flowers. Doesn't everyone love vintage? Well, at least lots of people love vintage. I adore vintage. You'll very often find me scouring a flea market on any given Sunday. After a successful launch of laser cut earrings with images of famous art, (think Starry Night) this seemed a natural progression.
At the recent New York Now trade show, Dunitz & Company debuted a collection of dangles, studs and pins with floral images from a host of antique illustrations. I spent hours and hours combing the internet for just the right images of roses, poppies, tulips and just about every other type of flowers, even cacti. Trust me. It wasn't an easy task to find great images with high resolution that are also available in the public domain. I'm certain I reviewed hundreds of beautiful images pinned to Pinterest. Sometimes you click and the URL is missing or wrong. Most times you click and find a low resolution image. If you're looking for artistic images, one fabulous source is Open Access from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. They've photographed and cataloged over 375,000 images from their collections available for unrestricted use.
Source ideas pop up in the most unusual ways. Some of you may know that we're actively posting on our 'Shop Dunitz' Instagram. (if you're not following us, you should be!) We've made lots of friends and connections using this social network. One of our followers (who we watch too) loves vintage and suggested we check out the files shared by the Rijksmuseum. Was she ever right. This too has been a wonderful resource. (Shown to the right, bontanicals as stud earrings!)
As my searching continued, I stumbled upon luscious images of vintage wallpapers from around the world. Some are European. Others Chinese. Often floral. And then there were those with birds. Did I mention birds? You betcha. I also hunted online for as many cool avian images as I could find. Vintage birds. Yes, we debuted those too. As dangles and studs. Why? Over the years I've sold fair trade jewelry to shops such as Wild Birds Unlimited. I've also worked with many zoos with aviaries. Dunitz & Company had to offer these too:). [If you don't know, now know that Dunitz also has created these earrings with custom images for a few of our clients. We can easily do it. Low minimums. And they are super affordable.]
Dunitz has always sold lots of beaded studs and fused glass studs. My guess is many of you reading this have purchased them for yourself or for your shops. You might even be wearing a pair today. It made sense to offer our vintage images as studs, not just dangles. This wallpaper design is floral with parrots...from vintage Chinese wallpaper. How cool is that?
When I started working with the laser cut designs, we only offered earrings. I'm certain I woke up in the middle of the night with a light bulb going off in my head. Pins. Pins. Pins. It made sense to add them to our arsenal. They're pretty and very affordable. (Do you ever wake up from a deep sleep brainstorming with ideas?)The punchline of this post? Dunitz & Company now offers more fair trade flowers! Yes, I mean in fair trade jewelry form. When I first masterminded this collection, I thought it would primarily sell to museum and botanical garden gift shops. I was wrong. Did I suggest earlier that everyone (including me) loves vintage? I've been more than pleasantly surprised and pleased with the host of gift boutiques that have ordered. The collection is new. I'm hopeful that it will sell through and my new customers will reorder. Keep your fingers crossed! Mine are. -ND
