photos: Rory Gunderson

http://ralphandduchess.com/

As a kid, designer sculptor and practicing visual artist Rochelle Goldberg would spend hours rummaging through her mother’s collection of costume jewelry. She would drape long pearl necklaces around her neck, adorn her fingers with over sized cocktail rings and fill up her arms with bangles and bracelets. It was then she knew she would make jewelry.

A few years ago Rochelle finally decided it was time to sculpt pieces herself, so she started taking metal-smithing classes. With her newly learned skills, she designed and produced a full line of jewelry and named it Ralph & Duchess after her childhood pet bunnies. Ralph & Duchess is already selling in charming shops like Albertine in the West Village in New York. Her work has been so successful that Rochelle just released, Bark, a unisex line. ‘I felt I needed to provide similar designs in bigger sizes for all the boys that kept nagging me for cuffs that would fit them,’ Rochelle says. She has zero consumer biases and would love to see any and everybody wearing her jewelry.

Recently, a little girl from Oklahoma sent Rochelle Goldberg a handwritten thank you letter for the Ralph & Duchess piece she bought as a gift for her mother. When Rochelle received the letter she was immediately flattered and—because of her modest ways—probably blushed a little. The little girl’s gratitude epitomizes true success to Rochelle: ‘It’s weird when something you hand-make can be worn anywhere by anyone, so it’s nice to have a connection with the people that like your stuff.’

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This entry was posted on Monday, May 4th, 2009 at 4:46 am and is filed under Back Issue, Features, Issue 2, The Come Up. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.