Ethically accessorize with eco friendly jewelry by Mollie Dash

By courtni for JustMeans | Aug 4, 2010 | 0 comments

Mollie Dash, an eco friendly designer based out of Brooklyn, creates one-of-a-kind jewelry with a vintage charm. She finds the materials for her pieces at local yard sales, thrift stores, as well as off the streets of New York. She believes that most discarded items still have value, and lives by the credo, “reduce, reuse, recycle.”

All of Dash’s designs are elaborately crafted, while sweetly alluring. Some of her most unique pieces include a 1969 Finnish penny, secret garden-esque keys, and a landscape pendant made from layered copper. Although most of the jewelry is metal based, there is still a great deal of color throughout the collection. Mollie prefers to use metal, cotton, linen cord over leather and plastic. She avoids purchasing new stones, and makes all of her items by hand. Her mission is to create ethical accessories that will last for years.

In packaging, instead of purchasing new packing materials, Mollie Dash reuses items such as tissue paper, news print, and magazines. She runs her jewelry studio from her home, where green living is second nature to her entire life. Dash monitors her waste and tries to limit the resources she uses in daily life. Mollie says, “I discovered recently that environmentalism is not about doing everything perfectly; it’s about doing what you can. How this translates into the products I make is that they’re made by a person who strives to leave a small footprint on the earth.”

Mollie Dash’s creative mind is rooted in her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in painting and printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University. At 25 years old, her roommate invited her to accompany her to a jewelry making studio. A bag of Sculpey and a box of copper wire later, Mollie was creating necklaces to complete her outfit, and soon learned that she had a passion and a talent for the art.

She moved to Los Angeles shortly after, and became employed at a bead shop near the beautiful beaches of Santa Monica. Dash picked up wire work, knotting, other hand techniques as well as the business aspect of the jewelry industry.

Mollie Dash’s unique designs, which are incredibly affordable, can be purchased at www.molliedash.com, or atwww.ebmerc.com. By combining vintage style with quality design, Mollie’s jewelry looks classic, chic, and straight off the runway. How does Dash explain her fashionable inspiration?

I’m daily in the midst of perpetually evolving street fashion, and witness firsthand the conversation that exists between it and high fashion, and everything in between.

Photo Credits: Courtesy of Mollie Dash, Ric Rac screw back earrings from the 1950s, Giant Key necklace