Musing no. 8 From Shakedown Street to Neiman Marcus

I have always been a maker.

Long before there was language for a “career,” my hands were busy…

beading, wrapping, weaving meaning into objects meant to be worn close to the body. In the late 80s, I made dreamcatchers, dread wraps, lighter covers, and peyote-stitch necklaces, setting up in the dirt lots outside Grateful Dead shows. Shakedown Street was my first marketplace, my first classroom, my first initiation.

I carried my work in a small handmade plywood box lined with velvet inserts. It held not just jewelry, but hours, devotion, and instinct. I sold my pieces or traded with other makers….currency measured in creativity, not cash. Once, I traded a peyote necklace wrapped around a crystal~forty hours of focused making..for three Oakland Mardi Gras tickets and a place to sleep!( I had no concept of “worth” in dollars). I only knew the joy of exchange, of being seen, of putting something handmade into the world.

It was never about profit.

It was about making.

After college, I became a preschool teacher. And still, the jewelry followed me. The mothers bought my pieces. Friends asked for more. On weekends, I set up a table at the Marin Farmers Market in San Rafael, selling beadwork to supplement my teaching income…slowly, quietly, listening to the pull that never left.

When I was 29 and eight months pregnant with my first child, I was visiting my father in Los Angeles. I would wander into the great department stores and stand in front of the glass jewelry cases, letting myself dream. Someday, I thought, that could be me….

One day, a salesperson admired the necklace my stepmother was wearing. It was one of my newest creations,Tibetan antique pendants paired with chunky turquoise and coral, each stone holding a story older than me. She asked if there were more. I was visiting from San Francisco, but I had sold several to friends in LA. She looked at me and said, “Bring your collection back tomorrow. I want you to meet the jewelry manager.”

The next day, I did.

The Neiman Marcus jewelry manager loved the work and booked me for my first trunk show and he scheduled for after I had my baby!!!

That moment changed everything.

I arrived at Neiman Marcus Beverly Hills with Sage in a sling, nursing at my breast, carrying jewelry I had made in the quiet hours between naps and midnight. The show was a success beyond anything I had imagined. So much so that they gave me a glass plaque with my name etched into it and a freestanding case to sell my work on consignment.

Neiman Marcus. Beverly Hills.

The girl from Shakedown Street.

That opportunity allowed me to stay home with my daughter and release my identity as a teacher. I became a full-time mother and a full-time maker, working in the sacred margins of the day,when the house was quiet, when the world softened.

Then came a phone call from New York.

Her name was Janet and she was the owner of a Soho showroom called Fragments. At the time, Fragments was one of the most influential jewelry agencies, representing the most respected designers of the era. She had seen one of my pieces on a buyer visiting her showroom and wanted to see my collection.

Until then, I had only sold at Neiman Marcus.

Janet took a chance on me, and in doing so, taught me an entirely new language. She showed me how to wholesale, how to structure a collection, how to stand in my work as a designer. Through Fragments, my jewelry found its way into Barneys New York, Saks Fifth Avenue and hundreds of boutiques in the US and across the ocean, through distributors in Japan, into Isetan in Tokyo and Hankyu in Osaka.I had to hire other women to help me make my designs we were so busy with orders!

Pages of press followed.

But Fragments offered me something even greater than visibility.

They were also representing another designer named Ashley.

That is how I met him.

Two parallel paths..both guided by hands, instinct, and devotion& recognized by the same woman, in the same moment in time. What began as separate creative journeys quietly aligned, eventually weaving into a shared life and a shared vision.

Looking back, it feels inevitable.

That chapter of my life was nothing short of extraordinary. Not just because my dream came true but because I learned that creation, motherhood, love, and recognition do not have to exist in opposition. They can rise together.

It was never just about jewelry….

It was about listening, to intuition, to timing, to the quiet voice that always whispered:

Keep making.

XX, Dara