Melissa Joy Manning Recycled Gold, Sustainably Made Jewelry
December 17 2008
We love it when we get those emails soliciting our business, like for printing materials, and we email them back and ask them if they’re using recycled paper and they say it’s just not possible! Our costs would go through the roof! The recycled sky is falling, the recycled sky is falling! And then we forward them the pricing info from www.greenerprinter.com, which uses recycled paper, buys offsets that make them 100% wind powered and is cheaper than Kinko’s.
That’s usually the last solicitation email we get from those folks.
Same thing with jewelry. We haven’t bought any jewelry in a long time, mainly because we feel so strongly about the toxic means by which we pull metal from the earth, usually involving lots of water and nasty chemicals like cyanide, which permeate the water table and make people sick. Often, we see amazing jewelry lines that literally make our mouths water (it’s a strange reaction to beauty, we know), but the designer is resistant to even exploring the idea of recycled gold so we walk away.
Get ready to drool.
Melissa Joy Manning designs jewelry using 100% recycled metals and conflict-free, responsibly sourced stones. The company initiated a Green Certification Process that focuses on waste reduction and recycling, energy and water conservation and pollution prevention. Their mission statement reads as follows: “We believe that challenging retailers and producers to be more aware of the impact that their products have on the environment and communities is ultimately what will drive real industry change.” Obviously, we have stumbled upon an Environista Extraordinaire.
But all this lovely karma aside, we challenge you to find a collection that’s more comprehensive—or as drop dead gorgeous. Think ridiculous cut-agate pieces looped onto chunky necklaces or fashioned onto rings like little miniature glass windows, druzy agate pendants that look like crumbled gold, cavancite studs in the brightest shade of periwinkle. Pricewise, the collection ranges from high to low—a one-of-a-kind black and white diamond ring weighs in at about $3,000, but 14-karat gold and ruby earrings are only $100. And the hoops, can we talk about the hoops? More than anything, we’ve been coveting a pair of simple, round hoops—we’ve even talked to designers about custom-making a pair—but no one seems to be able to make these wardrobe staples in recycled gold. Enter our saviour Melissa, who offers not one, not two, but 12 types of round hoops, plus oblong shapes, and stars, and carazy hearts that look like something our moms rocked in the ‘70s.
