My friend J.C. Garcia Lavin is truly an artist in every sense of the word. He is a stylist, an installation artist, and his eye for detail and design is unmatched. This is all very apparent once you see the way he utilizes the space in his Manhattan apartment. Showcased below on LXTV- you get a glimpse into his digs, and see his impressive art and book collection.


JC was also gracious enough to give us a list of his favorite, most inspiring, and best conversation-starting coffee table books. These you MUST check out:

Julius Shulman, “Modernism Rediscovered” (The best late 40’s, 50’s, 60’s case study house book, shot by the best architecture photographer of the time)
Robert polidori, “After the flood” (amazing photos of the aftermath of Katrina in New Orleans)
Mathew Barney, “The Creamaster Cycle” (all of his work in one book)
Damian Hirst, “I want to spend the rest of my life everywhere, with everyone, always, for ever, now” (Great Artbook on all his best pieces)
“Cream” & “Ice Cream” (great book on fashion, Art, design, and journalism)
“10X10″ (great architecture)
“The Book of Vegas” (shiny upostered cover!…all great photos of the Old days Vegas)
“Anish Kapoor” by PHAIDON
“Richard Avedon, Performance”
“John Currin” (produced by Gagosian)
“Magnum Stories” (amazing photo, Art, & journalism photography)
Gerard Richter, “Catalog Raisonne”
Jean Prouve, “The poetics of the technical object”
“In my life” Stephan Sagmeister

Hopefully you’ll be stacking them on your coffee table like so-

Big Kiss!
Lee

My BFF and kindred spirit, Nony, has owned and designed for her LA boutique, House of Petro Zillia, for years. With the recent launch of their e-commerce website, now Nony’s signature designs and hand selected vintage pieces can now be purchased globally. Confident, carefree, and fearless, Nony’s LA attitude directly translates into the flowing fabrics, ornate details and fun prints of her line.

Take a glimpse into her “Fantasy Fashion Island” and check out House of Petrozillia

Here’s a collection of some of my personal favorites from the website:

Dress by Petro Zillia

Vintage Bag by J. Preston

Skirt by Smoke & Mirrors

Danish Vase from the 1960’s

Enjoy!
Big Kiss.
Lee

Recently while perusing NY Magazine’s fashion blog, The Cut, we came across one of our favorite customers, Lynn Dell. Dell owns a posh store on the Upper West Side called Off Broadway Boutique, and she is nothing short of being one of the most stylish women we’ve run across. The fact that she’s a nOir fan, we assure you, has nothing to do with it.

Lynn was originally photographed for Advanced Style - a street style blog showcasing the timeless and amazing style of people of an ‘advanced age’. The blog author, Ari Seth Cohen, was recently interviewed by Italian Vogue and brought not only his insight on aging, but a photo of Lynn herself. Ari says that “Confidence is the best accessory.” and Dell certainly wears it well.
Below is a shot of Lynn wearing our Joan Bracelet and paring it with our Donatella Necklace.

As Lynn puts it “Dress for the theatre of your life!”

In our new ‘I mean…’ column on the blog, we’ll be featuring things, people, and places that we’re -for lack of a better word- OBSESSED with. Ironically, ‘I mean…’ means we’re speechless, and we can’t even think of a word worthy enough to use.

I mean… How amazing is this furniture? The leather couch and sofa below were made by my super talented friend Christian. He and his partner, Duane, specialize in Interior Design (Check out their website: InXDesign) and both the Sofa and Armchair are available in OTHER METALLIC FINISHES. I NEED Gold this second, but they are all amazing. I haven’t stopped talking about these pieces for weeks now, and I’ve shown them to everyone.


There are definitely some other great pieces worth checking out- especially the fiber optic lamp. Everything on the site is so innovative, modern, and functional. I hope to own a piece someday.

Big Kiss,
Lee

No doubt, the most fashionable movie this year has been Sex and the City 2, and with my friend Patricia Field styling, we were lucky enough to get involved.

You can bid on this necklace HERE.

Pat always knows exactly what she wants, and when she comes to the office I am fortunate enough to get a glimpse of her vision. She knew she wanted something oversized with red tones for Samantha in this particular scene, so me and my team got to work. What was created was an abstract stained glass bib necklace, and it was perfect.

As you can probably guess, I was elated to see the scene that I was sworn to secrecy over. Miley and Samantha show up to Smith Jared’s premier in matching outfits, the only thing they wear differently are both nOir custom made necklaces. Miley opted for an edgier spike necklace that was inspired by our spike ring (inadvertently dubbed “The Rihanna ring”), while Kim, ever so elegantly wore the ombre red stone piece.

The necklace is made of 9 hand placed faceted glass stones, and the settings and chain are plated 18k gold, it would normally retail for $1,500.

Maimonides is the first and only Brooklyn hospital to receive designation as a children’s hospital within a hospital, and this enables them to provide the highest pediatric care to children among only 177 other hospitals in the nation.

Bid on Ebay HERE!
If this necklace is a little too bold for your liking, you can help the children at Maimonides by donating HERE.

What a busy weekend for us! Noir has been seen all around town on our fave girls. Our BFF Kelis wore our Maasai Beaded ‘Sobat’ Necklace to an event- lookin amazing per usual-

The Sobat can be purchased HERE.
And, our lovers, The Blonds- asked us to assist them in outfitting icon Kylie Minogue for a couple of things. We made these Claws a while back for their Fashion Show- and they resurfaced on Kylie at G-A-Y Heaven. Wow!!! Look out for more Kylie/Blonds/Noir coming up.

Yes, we’re all pining for a pair- but unfortunately these guys are unthinkable in the real world. Even for us!!
Happy Monday!!!

Recently, the amazingly fierce Eve teamed up with Puma for a couple of events and was pictured wearing our fave summer earrings! Lightweight and swingy, these multi colored glass seed bead hoops are perfect for the beach, or in this NYC sweltering heat. Eve’s fourth album is coming out this year, and we hope these earrings are an omen. They were dubbed the ‘Enkai’ earrings, which means “Sky” in Maasai, and for Ms. Eve, the sky’s the limit.

The earrings are available HERE for purchase on our website.

We’re blown away, yet again, by our dear friend Kelis. This song hasn’t left our heads since we’ve heard it, and the video is SO Kelis, and SO good. We’re totally digging the disco vibe, and are elated to tell you nOir has made the cut! A ton of our pieces are in the video, and most of those are available on our website. We posted a while ago about her custom silver chain wig, and she rocks it again! Kelis looks amazing, as always- and the lights at the end of the video are the coolest thing we’ve seen in a while. Check out the video, and below are some stills of what we could grab in between the flashing lights.


The Venus Necklace Can be Purchased by clicking HERE.
The Pyramid Ring can be purchased HERE.
The Pyramid Bracelet HERE.

A nOir insider and close friend brought us these tears from a magazine today. The magazine is called EXILE, and it’s named after a 14 member Japanese boy band. EXILE has it’s own empire in Japan consisting of a Magazine, Store, and a bunch of other things. Really, the point here is Lady Gaga wearing our rings. She wore them for her press tour a while ago, and must have partially styled herself for this shoot and popped ‘em on. One was even in the Paparazzi Video! The shots couldn’t be any better, and I must say- we kinda miss the blonde/blunt bang’s Gaga.

Enjoy the shots, and you can purchase the rings below.

Cone Pyramid (Click Here)!

Sided Pyramid Here!! - Which She wore twice.

The office fave- our pave stud pyramid ring, Here!!

Hi Guys- Lee here.
You might have noticed we added some new collections to our website. The new groups are some of my favorites to date, and I thought I’d share a little of the inspiration for this collection with you.

Prior to starting work on the collection I had re-visited one of my favorite movies, Something Wild, from 1986. In it, the free-spirited Lulu (played by Melanie Griffith in the most amazing black bob wig) is a wild child with a penchant for colorful African jewelry. The way she piles it on – with all of the colors and textures- is so stylized and timeless.
Coincidentally, near that time I had also attended a Pow-Wow with my kids. The modern and colorful Navajo jewelry stuck in my head, and the energy of the entire event really inspired me. Both the African Maasai and the Navajo seemingly fused together in my brain, with their similar process and colors. I knew that I wanted to create pieces that exuded their playful nature. I also wanted to modernize the pieces, so they aren’t so literal- we added strong metal hardware, and metallic beads to keep it fresh.

Another exciting thing for me is our Dagger group. It seemed to be the natural progression of things after we decided to move on from the pyramids. I love the juxtaposition of making something really hard and edgy into something feminine and delicate. Originally I was inspired by a dagger charm that was passed on to me by my aunt- given to her by a Bulgarian Prince. We mixed metals and added pave touches to show the detail on the handles and blades.

Plastic is one of my favorite materials ever- I’ve used it for years in our past collections. It’s so fun and pliable, and really makes a statement. I love the idea of layering- both in the piece itself (each bracelet is layers of thin, hollow plastic) and layering several bracelets on each arm. You can create a ton of different silhouettes in a rainbow of colors- especially because each bracelet is so light.

Here are some photos from the Pow-Wow, and the movie poster for ‘Something Wild’:

This is my most favorite Dagger Peice:

Here are the plastics, making their debut in Italian Vogue editorial, styled by Ms. Lori Goldstein:

Make sure to check the new collections out, they really were a labor of love. Comment your thoughts, I’d really like to hear what you have to say! Also, follow us on twitter!!
twitter.com/noirjewelry

Big Kiss,
Lee