Harwell Godfrey
MARIN COUNTY, CA
In their own words
“Stones are incredible. And there's just something about them where I feel like a magpie or something. I want to touch them, I want to see them, and be close to them.”
-Lauren
Jason’s interview with Lauren
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Jason: Today, we're talking to Lauren Harwell Godfrey. Wonderful. So, tell us Lauren, what do you love about jewelry?
Lauren: Well, there's so much to love about jewelry. I think the thing that I get really drawn to are the stones. I just think stones are incredible. And there's just something about them where I feel like a magpie or something. I just want to touch them, I want to see them, and be close to them. So that's definitely part of it. And then the other thing I love about jewelry, and I guess this is coming more for me as a designer than a consumer, they're like mini sculptures. And I like making things, so wrapping my brain around how to make something three-dimensional and interesting and tiny is a lot of fun.
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Jason: So cool. Tell me, how did you become a jewelry designer?
Lauren: I've had a few career pivots. I actually started out designing in advertising. I was an art director and a creative director and worked on that for over fifteen years, and then left that industry and went to culinary school and had my eyes set on being a food stylist and recipe writer and working kitchens and doing a bunch of fun stuff. And in the middle of that process, I was just cooking, cooking, cooking non-stop. And I was like, “I just need a break from cooking today. I want to make something else.” And I made myself a really funky sculptural piece of jewelry that I was like, “I'm going to wear this to a music festival.” And it was made out of leather and stones, labradorite was the stone. And I had so much fun making it. I started making more and I was just wearing them around for me personally. And people started seeing them and thought they were interesting. And I got a lot of people asking me to start making them for them. It just grew organically out of that. And I realized I was having more fun making those pieces than I was making food. And so, I pivoted once again and went into jewelry, but realized pretty quickly, well not quite quickly enough, a couple of years in, that making every single piece myself, while interesting, didn't feel very scalable. And I thought, “I love doing this. I want this to become a real business.” And so I decided to focus on design and have other amazing artisans do the work for me and thought, “If I'm going to do that, I'd like to do that in the fine jewelry space.” And that's when I made the switch to doing it in fine.
Jason: And do you have a specialty now?
Lauren: You know, it's constantly evolving, but I would say people recognize my work for its intricacy and geometric patterns and colors. There's a lot of inlay in my work, which isn’t something that you see a lot. Other people certainly do it, but I'd say that's something we specialize in. And I think just the pattern play. I really take inspiration from the African Diaspora. I'm a Black jewelry designer and find a lot of inspiration in vintage textiles specifically from Africa. And I'm not literal about how I interpret them, but it's certainly, kind of the way that shapes are combined.
Jason: I love that. Your jewelry does have healing energy properties. Is there a certain stone you personally gravitate toward?
Lauren: Oh my gosh. It changes every day. I'm looking at my shelf right now and there's a giant amethyst, there's a huge piece of tiger eye. I am wearing chalcedony, which I really like a lot right now. I made a heart to benefit Futures Without Violence, and it has a chalcedony stone center to it. And for some reason, I can't take it off. But I feel like with the stones and their healing energy, it's something that depending on what you need, you might gravitate towards one thing or the other. I don't know, they're all very special. I could go on and on. Lapis, labradorite like I said before, something I worked with a lot in the beginning. Turquoise I love.
Jason: Turquoise is incredible. Tell me about your bespoke offering. And you can (you) also tell me more about your private atelier service?
Lauren: So currently it's something that I've been talking about a lot in social media and through my website. But yeah, I'm a designer. I love to design things. So, if someone's looking for something special that they want to customize just for them, we can do everything from completely starting from scratch custom, where it doesn't look like anything else in the collection, but obviously it's our work, so it's going to look like it's coming for me. But we can start from scratch and do new things. We can source stones for people. We can also modify existing designs. Like if somebody says, “My kids' birthstones are—,” I’m actually working on a project like this right now, “aquamarine and peridot. Can you make a bangle that incorporates those birthstones? But I like this bangle that you already make.” The answer is yes. We can definitely do that. Because of my design background and having done graphic design work as an art director, I love to design engravings and I design them all myself. And so, when somebody wants something personalized, they can also come to us just to say, “Hey, I like this piece. I want a special engraving on the back.” That's something that we can do and I personally will attend to and design myself. Something that I'm really excited about that I've been encouraging our customers is to upcycle their existing jewelry. If they have something that's set in a way that's maybe out of fashion for them, or they just don't see themselves wearing a lot, but they love the stones, we love the idea of using existing stones and giving them new life. From a sustainability standpoint, I think it's really interesting. And then they also just have such sentimental value. We are also working to open an atelier space in the Bay Area, which is where I'm based. And I'm excited about it because I think there's a lot that we can do online. And thankfully, technology has made it so easy to connect with people and have meetings and do different things remotely. But I think for my local customers, they love the idea of meeting up and having a conversation in person. And as hopefully, with COVID, we can get back to that. I'm currently working on opening a space and that'll be a great place just to be able to meet with people.
Jason: That's cool. Can you tell me how you describe that workplace you want to open?
Lauren: I'm seeing it as a Hardwell Godfrey universe kind of space. I want people to walk into it and feel like they're transported into our world, which I think is kind of a jewel box vibe. I'm working on some new packaging that's colorful. And I think it's going to be a space that has color and beauty. It'll also have objects and things that inspire me and my work. It's going to be this magical universe.
Jason: If you had an opportunity to dress a famous person from the past or present, who would it be?
Lauren: Goodness. Well, since you said past or present, I kind of want to give you two. I would say past Josephine Baker. She's such an icon. And that Art Deco sensibility is really interesting to me because there's so much geometry play from that time. And I feel like there's a connection between that era and the work that I do. I also think African design was very influential in Art Deco so there's commonalities. I'm having a disco infatuation right now, so Diana Ross, as more of a recent living person, beautiful human. I would love. I just launched a collection called Stardust and I can just see those earrings on Diana Ross. I think it'd be amazing.
Jason: That’s awesome. Tell me a love story. It could be an engagement event that you maybe were part of or a really romantic customer story.
Lauren: I have been making a lot more rings and things for engagements, which has been really fun. And it's interesting because it's kind of high pressure because you want to make sure you're fulfilling the wishes of the person who's ordering it, but then also hoping that their intended will appreciate it as well. There was one really special project that I was asked to work on that I thought was so interesting. And it was the person who asked for it, (he) wanted to make a pendant for his intended. And it was opal. And he said, “Will you help me find the right opal? Will you make it feel like it's coming from you? But I want it to be special and unique.” I just love that kind of a project. And I thought it was so romantic because he was like, “I know her, and I know what she's going to want, and she's going to want something that's not a ring.” And to me, that's romance—knowing your person that well and going to lengths to find the exact right thing and really putting your imprint on it. And she loved it. They were so cute and sent me photos. I thought that was very cool, very special.
Jason: That is. You help benefit different charities, of course, but one of them is the World Central Kitchen. Can you tell me about your involvement with them and other charities in your community?
Lauren: So, I actually launched a series on April 27th of last year. And the first one, I call the Charity Heart series. It's not a very original name I suppose, but it's basically a pendant. And the design, I added my kind of signature triangle motif down the middle and it made it look like a broken heart that was put back together. And I thought that was an interesting motif for all of the things that have been going on. When I originally designed it, it was to benefit World Central Kitchen exclusively. It was malachite, a heart chakra stone. It was a response to COVID, knowing that people out there have food insecurity. And that just broke my heart. And so that design I developed specifically to address that. I originally was giving 30% of the proceeds to World Central Kitchen. And then summer came around, and the gross injustices and murder of Black Americans started happening and coming to the forefront—it didn't just start happening. It's been happening for a very, very long time. But the Black Lives Matter movement was really picking up steam and there's just a lot of need to support that community. And so, I thought this motif isn't something that just suits World Central Kitchen and food insecurity, this broken heart can speak for a lot of different things. And there's a lot of need right now. And so, I introduced the second one for the NAACP and ended up switching how I was doing my donation to making 100% of the proceeds go to World Central Kitchen and 100% of the proceeds go to NAACP. I realized there are a lot of different stones I can do this with, so I want to keep introducing these. I made a third one and just introduced that in February for a nonprofit that's very close to my heart called Futures Without Violence. And they do a lot of different things, but they help prevent violence against women and children around the world. And they're building a courage museum. I'm on the board of Futures Without Violence. I'm very involved in what's happening there. And this museum is going to be a place for teaching people, in our community and otherwise, about how to be activists and proactively do work to prevent a lot of the violence that's happening in the world. It’s a place to share stories and to mourn some of the past events. But just a really, beautiful space. There’s a lot of interesting interactivity and information that's going to be shared, even from a neuroscience perspective on violence. In under a year, I've raised over $157,000 from the sale of these hearts that have been donated to these charities combined.
Jason: Incredible.
Lauren: Thank you. And it's just important to me. It's something that I've always believed in as a human being, in a position of privilege, give back. I wish everybody would do that. I think the world would be a very different place. But at least I can do my small part and I have more hearts on the horizon.
Jason: Oh, Lauren, that's amazing. You know, it's just another reason when somebody buys your jewelry, they know they're not just buying a piece, but they’re actually buying something that gives back. And it's nice that leaders out there are taking the stance and making a difference because all of us can do something.
Lauren: Thank you. I think that people who invest in me and invest in my work give me that permission and that's really great because I take that very seriously. And I will continue to give back.
Jason: That’s amazing. And let’s talk about some of your most popular items that people should know about that are coming from your heart. What would they be?
Lauren: I would say my bangles are having a good moment. It's funny. I design things that I like to wear, and then I think other people end up liking to wear it. So, I love having a stack of bangles on my wrist. And the way that I design them so that they can be stacked and worn together. And even if it's like, I make a knife-edge bangle, I make an inlay bangle, I just introduced one that has a diamond pattern to it. And you can wear them all together and they just look cool and eclectic together. My rainbow bead necklaces are very popular, and I have plans to introduce more versions of that. But those are really fun. And they have a hexagon, we call it foundation, at the base of them. And then all of the pendants that we make can be clipped on and off of that foundation. They'll have bales that open. So those are a lot of fun because it brings some color to an outfit and you can wear our different pendants with it. I've sold a lot of these heart pendants for charity, which is great. I'm so proud and amazed by the work that they're doing, they deserve our continued support. So those will be evergreen. All the money forever will go to those organizations.
Jason: Lauren, you're amazing. Thank you so much.
Lauren: Sure. Thank you. Well, I'm so excited to be on Meet the Jewelers. Thank you for having me.
