Artists and Fleas at Chelsea Market presents a curated showcase of designers and vintage collections, including Cynthia Rybakoff modern vintage jewelry, as part of New York Fall Fashion Week 2012 from September 4th-9th. The one week Fashion Week pop-up will bring new collections and new debuts from more than 30 designers from across the Artists and Fleas’ community.

Artists and Fleas at Chelsea Market, 75 Ninth Avenue, located opposite Amy's Bread.

Fresh Direct

I was recently featured in the Weekend Market Picks section of Karen Seiger's must read, everything you need to know about the New York City market scene blog, Markets of New York City. Read the article here. 

Then buy her official insiders book listing the best the Big Apple has to offer, simply entitled, Markets of New York City, a Guide to the Best Artisan, Farmer, Food and Flea Markets.

Photo courtesy of Markets of New York City

Chelsea Girl

Artists & Fleas, the Williamsburg shopping mecca that set the standard for the current New York market scene as we know it today, returns to New York's Chelsea Market for a 3 month Spring season showcase, after a triumphant holiday pop-up in December.

Cynthia Rybakoff will be a featured independent designer at the market, along with a hand picked group of Brooklyn's most compelling artists, designers and vintage dealers. Stop by to view the Spring 2012 collection, located beneath New York's celebrated High Line at 15th and Tenth, and treat yourself at one of Chelsea Market's delectable eateries.

Artists & Fleas at Chelsea Market, open daily 10:30 - 7pm, March 1st - June 3rd. For additional information, visit artistsandfleas.com

Love For Sale

For 25 years, God's Love We Deliver has created nutritious meals for the body and soul. This weekend, Artists & Fleas presents a very special Valentine's sale and fundraiser, Love For Sale, to benefit the organization which has improved the health and well-being of those living with HIV/AIDS, cancer and other serious illnesses, by delivering high quality meals.

Ricky Becker of Spooky Boutique, has transformed a part of the market into a red room, merchandising the romantic works of over 20 participating artists, designers and vintage collectors, with a generous portion of the proceeds going to God's Love We Deliver.

Shop this weekend for all things red, including my vintage Lips earrings, pictured above, and enjoy some Brooklyn style DJ Karaoke on Saturday, starting at 5pm.

Artists & Fleas is located at 70 N. 7th Street between Kent & Wythe in Williamsburg.

Join the Club

After months of top secret development, my Resort 2012 collaboration with Club Monaco launches today! I've designed a mini collection of modern pendants with a vintage look and feel. Inspired by Victorian Scottish and English sterling silver, with lots of great period detailing, these limited edition pieces can be yours at a very affordable price.

You will COVET and adore my vintage classic Anchor of Hope and Albert Watch Fob pendants, created in pewter and brass with nickel free antique rhodium plating. Based on 19th century period men's accessories (think Sherlock Holmes style coolness), they're updated with a feminine touch.

Like other independent designers chosen to create cutting edge items for top retailers like J. Crew, Madewell, Topshop and Target under their own brand name, my collaboration with Club Monaco is an amazing opportunity to have my work presented in a super hip fashion environment, with tons of great clothes and accessories.

Cynthia Rybakoff for Club Monaco pendants, $89. See my website for a full list of stores. If yours is not listed, you may be able order it from another location.

Silver Obsession

"One to Watch: Cynthia Rybakoff's Sterling Silver Obsession" ~ special thanks to NBC New York and Catherine Blair Pfander for this thoughtful and definitively groovy profile on the Thread|NY insider fashion blog!

Find Cynthia Rybakoff modern vintage jewels weekends only, from 10-7pm, at my Artists & Fleas pop-up shop, or online at Supermarket.

Color Me Mine

Want, want want. These brightly-glazed ceramic colliers have an art deco feel and are strung on seductive soft cording. Handmade in France by Marion Vidal. For collectors, for color enthusiasts, at Anthropologie.

Inages courtesy of Anthropologie.

Good Enough To Eat

Pret a porter or pret a manger? Introducing Mise en Place Vintage, Brooklyn's newest source for DIY vintage jewelry, as well as unique finished items. Browse a delectable selection of "ingredients" at the vintage bead bar, gathered from all over the globe, for making your own designs. Or say the word, and Cynthia or Courtney will help you put a little something together, right there on the spot.

For the connoisseur, sample one of a kind and limited edition pieces from the Mise en Place House Reserve Collection, created entirely of vintage parts from the Mise en Place bead bar, including mid-century modern plastics, Japanese ceramics, and West German glass and chains. Vistors can even catch a glimpse of the designers at work, creating new pieces each weekend at Artists & Fleas!

Visit Mise en Place on Tumblr and Facebook.

Images courtesy of Mise en Place Vintage

New Dimensions

Pallas ~ The Greek Titan God of Warcraft. Envisioned + styled by Asanti Austin, and featuring Cynthia Rybakoff jewelry.

Images courtesy of Dimensionmagazine.

Fashion Week Redux

There's a bit of Fashion Week for the rest of us, happening this weekend at Artists & Fleas, in Williamsburg on the waterfront. Come browse a curated showcase of over 12 emerging independent jewelry, clothing and accessory designers as they unveil new looks and new lines from their Spring/Summer collections.

New Designers & New Designs will also shine, sparkle and dazzle with a spring assortment of my fine fashion jewels! Read more about what folks are saying about Cynthia Rybakoff jewelry, over in the 'Burg, after the jump.

Images courtesy of Artists & Fleas.

Travels With My Aunt

She's the original Gaga, having survived an early career as an infamous cabaret singer, and several marriages to curious gentlemen of European extraction. She's been around the world more times than she cares to recall. She loves to collect souvenir items, and doesn't think it's touristy at all. She has a flaming bouffant and long lacquered nails to match, with impressive stones on almost every finger. She wears Cleopatra eyeliner and flowing caftans in loud prints. She makes flourishing gestures with her bejeweled wrists and hands for emphasis, as if casting a spell. She drinks bellinis at 10, espresso at 4, martinis at 6, Campari and soda at 8, followed by a continental dinner at 10, her only meal of the day.

She is your aunt, not you, of the understated chic urban set. But you love touristy things too, especially little hand painted enamel charms from fabulous places you and your husband are too busy to visit, what with careers, a family, and a home to manage. Maybe some day, you tell yourself, when the kids have grown, you'll plan fabulous trips around the world, more times than you care to recall.

Cynthia Rybakoff one of a kind sterling silver and vintage enamel travel charm collection, available weekends at Artists & Fleas, Brooklyn.

Love Tokens

I'm moving to Brooklyn! Cynthia Rybakoff jewelry debuts today at Artist & Fleas in Williamsburg, with a special selection of modern vintage jewels for Valentine's Day. Shop the entire collection, all winter long, at Artists & Fleas' spacious new location. See more of my Love Tokens, available exclusively at Artist's and Feas.

70 North 7th Street
Between Wythe and Kent
Weekends 12 - 8pm

Tribal Vibes

Paris. Spring. 2011. Could have fooled me. I thought it was 1973, judging from those chunky African trade bead chokers and bracelets! At second glance, Isabel Marant's spring collection is more fabulous than I thought. Ultra modern easy styling that's preppy chic, and urban bohemian all at once, with a sophisticated mix of texture and color that's soft and feminine. A striking contrast to the heavy glass bead bracelets and chokers that scream hippie. It really works.

I bought tons of African trade beads, when I was first starting out, including the interlocking snake beads, featured heavily in Marant's appealing spring accessories. The jewelry I made back then was rather lumpy, but colorful and full of that 1970's New York City ethnic vibe. Little did I know, my African trade beads were bona fide antiques, made predominately in Venice and Bohemia from the late 1400s through the early 1900s, and traded in Africa and the Americas for goods, services and even slaves.

Today African trade beads have been making somewhat of a comeback. The beads themselves, when authentic, are quite collectible, plus they fetch a pretty penny. I quite adore them right now, for livening up a modern look with an unexpected tribal twist. And won't they be a refreshing change this season from all the fussy glitz, and be-ribboned rhinestones we've grown accustomed to?

Images courtesy of accessoriesmagazine.com.

Christmas Balls

From the Cynthia Rybakoff archives, here's an understated holiday look from 1989. I'm not going to exaggerate the time and effort that went into gluing each Swarovski crystal and vintage bugle bead, one piece at a time, with tweezers and delicate fingertips, to this 3 tiered neck piece with a zillion sparkling baubles. If made today, the piece would retail for about $18,000.

The necklace was part of a collection designed for the Fall/Winter Isaac Mizrahi runway show, and included a braided suede wrist wrap, that doubled as a necklace. The versatility of this piece is nicely demonstrated in this not at all provocative ad for Harvey Nichols.

Serious Moonlight

Moonlight Necklace by Cynthia Rybakoff

Each holiday season I donate a special piece of jewelry for the silent auction at the Deer Valley Celebrity Skifest, an invitational ski event which pairs former Olympic ski legends with television and film celebrities for a weekend of skiing, live music and fundraising for the environmental group Waterkeeper Alliance, which supports and empowers Waterkeeper member organizations to protect communities, ecosystems and water quality.

This year I created The Moonlight Necklace, with a variety of unusual black semi-precious stones, which shimmer with golden highlights. Three rows of freeform black moonstone nuggets form a bib, suspended from a strand of oxidixed sterling silver wire wrapped black tourmaline slices, obsidian and black spinel marquise briolettes, and faceted pyrite rondels.

Waterkeeper Alliance is among the world’s fastest growing environmental organizations, with nearly 200 local Waterkeepers patrolling rivers, lakes and coastal waterways on six continents. For more information about this vital organization, founded in 1999 by environmental attorney and activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr., visit their website, and like them on Facebook.

Meet The Designer

There's a brand new feature on IndieShop.com worth taking note of! Did you ever wonder about how independent designers got their start, get their inspiration, or how they make their unique products? Now you can get an intimate glimpse into the mind of the artisan, with "Meet The Designer" video clips, located on the product pages of each designer's store on IndieShop.com.

Here I am, above, discussing how I got my start as a jewelry designer, and my first big break, before becoming a corporate jewelry designer for brands such as Ralph Lauren and Tommy Hilfiger, and what inspires me now that I've decided to be an "indie" designer once again.

Here's my husband Matt Shapoff, whose Handmade On Peconic Bay collection of modern vintage photographic prints is also available on IndieShop, revealing the secrets of how he creates his cyanotypes prints, totes and scarves, plus the mysterious significance of the year 1895!

Videos courtesy of IndieShop.com.

Death In Venice {In Style}

Some inspiration for all you little fashion creatures of the night, skull jewelry by the venerable luxury Venetian jewelry house, Codognato! Famously known for their intricately rendered vanitas themed jewels, skulls have become the trademark motif of the house. The subject of vanitas or "vanities" was popularized by 16th century Dutch painters, who meant the skulls to represent the vanity of living.

A cautionary tale for the viewer about the transient nature of wealth and pleasures of the flesh, the skull and and other symbolic objects, such as snuffed out candles, dead flowers and rotting fruit, were meant to remind us of the certainty of death.

Images courtesy of Elle, Quintessentially, NotesPrecieuses, Paula Stenberg.

Nice Ice Baby!

Sweet as sugar, with none of the calories! My new Sugar Cube Necklace is a unique holiday gift, at a great price. Created with hammered rock crystal and sterling silver, the surface texture of the crystal cube resembles a tasty hunk of rock candy. Yum. While you're at it, soothe that sugar rush, with a Crystal Calm Bracelet, or earrings, and the natural healing energy of pure rock crystal.

Cynthia Rybakoff sterling silver and rock crystal Sugar Cube Necklace, $28.00, Crystal Calm Bracelet, $68.00, and Crystal Calm Earrings, $18.00, available at CynthiaRybakoff and Supermarket.

Treasures & Pleasures

The name Treasures & Pleasures is well suited to describe George Yzquierdo’s fabulous curated collection of vintage and antique jewelry. Besides supplying what appears to be most of New York with pretty baubles each week, George happens to be extremely knowledgeable as to the provenance of his wares. A definite must when buying vintage! You can find him chatting with customers streaming through his booth each weekend at The Hester Street Fair. Be sure to check out his website, for even more glorious fashion finds.

Gorgeous photomontages courtesy of Rafael Medrano.

Sicaria In The City

Last week I had a surprise visit from Khushbu Sikaria, of the sicaria, at Madison Square Market, where I was promoting my holiday collection for IndieShop.com. Khushbu, who is also the founder of sicaria.com, a luxury fashion e-tailer launching soon, was visiting designers in NYC + enjoying herself in the Big Apple! She suggested a video presentation of my holiday collection might be fun for her blog, so I did my best not to sound too silly.

Video courtesy of the sicaria.