When I came across Joomi Lim‘s jewelry line at Opening Ceremony a few months ago, the first thing I noticed was the name. I knew I’d heard it before, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. And then it hit me: Joomi was the name behind a wildly successful line of t-shirts in the early 2000′s. (The ultimate example? Christina Aguilera rocked one of her Swarovski crystal-bedazzled “Super Girl” tops on the cover of Rolling Stone in July of 2000.)
While the days of blingy t-shirts are far behind her, the self-taught Joomi is still very much a force in the fashion industry. She started designing jewelry in 2009 — along with her husband Xavier Ricolfi, an industrial designer — and the duo then set out to create signature pieces at an accessible price point. Perfectly capturing the rock-and-roll, masculine-meets-womanly sensibility that is so sought after these days, Joomi makes an effort to inject a bit of femininity into her tough-chic pieces.
“I still love working with Swarovski crystals,” she says. “I think we all love that girly touch and added bit of sparkle — and customers love them. Just by adding a few jewels, it makes even the edgiest pieces look feminine.”
Even though much of the “trendy” jewelry today can be characterized as a chaotic tangle or chains in a sea of spikes, Joomi feels confident that she was ahead of the curve, incorporating these elements into her debut collection almost three years ago. The oversaturation of these styles doesn’t bother the designer — the most important thing for Joomi is that she stay true to her own unique vision. “I used to design thinking too much about what people would like, but now I try to just focus on things that I like or that my friends will like. It makes my life so much easier.”
Click through to check out some Joomi Lim jewels and the designer in her showroom!
By Alyssa Vingan
