Some girls just have a knack for jewelry. I am not one of those girls, but 10 Crosby (Derek Lam) design director Liz Giardina most certainly is. She's got armfuls—and knuckle...fuls?—of curated leather and silver bling that some trend-hunter without the time or know-how would pay a crazy premium for. But that assemblage, complete with her year-round signature chocolate nail color, makes every. single. thing she wears look amazing. A vintage black jumpsuit (like the one she's wearing above), a t-shirt and jeans—you name it. Her hands do the talking. And, to our delight, she told us a thing or two about them. —E.W.
'I work with my hands, so I don’t like my hands to look delicate. Lady Godiva by Essie is the only nail-polish color I wear. I don’t really like any sort of red, and this is masculine but it’s not black; it’s kind of ‘tailored’ in a way. I didn’t go to school for design, I went to school for sculpture, and I have a lot of sculptural rings—I’ve worn this much jewelry since I was like twelve or thirteen, so it’s like who I am. I never take three of my rings off, unless I’m exercising or something. And this whole right arm [rattles bracelets] comes off when I draw, which is, like, all the time, so if I’m called into a meeting, it takes me 30 seconds to put my jewelry back on. I'm right-handed...but I just think all this stuff looks better on the right. The left arm is always fairly bare. The only time I ever have anything on the left arm is when I wear matching cuffs, which I thought about wearing today but I couldn’t find one of them. In my apartment, I have these pine boxes, and each pine box has a different theme of jewelry. Like, one of them is all-black, one is reds and neutrals, like leathers, one is turquoise with silver, one is silver alone, and then one leather Tibetan box where I keep mostly what I wear every day. I lose shit all the time. I lost four really, really important, good, awesome rings in the past year. What I spend completely ranges—some stuff is kind of expensive, some of it’s not. A lot of things I wear were gifts: every person that I’ve dated, I just say, 'This is what I want right now.' [Laughs] Like, I really wanted—they’re sort of no big deal—these four sterling bracelets from Love Adorned. I really like sterling because it’s soft. And I have a bracelet by Jacqueline Rabun, an American designer but she’s in London, and she’s amazing. I don't wear gold a lot, but I always wear this one ring that my dad gave my mom when they were dating when they were eighteen. I used to work with Marco Zanini, who's at Rochas now, and he gave me one. And my mom and I call each other 'Fatty,' so I have my Fatty bracelet. I actually had it made for her and then I just stole it back.”
—as told to ITG
Liz' jewelry (in her own words):
Bracelets:
- Sterling * linked bangles from Timbuktu on 2nd Ave
- Woven black leather bracelet from Beads of Paradise on 17th Street
- Sterling engraved ID bracelet made in L.A. originally for my mom
- Leather Hermès bracelet
- Tiffany's faux watch bangle
- 20+ leather bracelets that I bought on the street in Florence
- Sterling and gold double bubble bracelet by Jacqueline Rabun)
- Sterling irregular bangle bought at New York Adorned (now Love Adorned)
Other arm
- Another sterling irregular bangle bought at New York Adorned (now Love Adorned)
Rings:
- Afghan seal ring
- Double-moon sterling ring from somewhere in Oaxaca
- (This is the ring finger - starting big and moving in)
- sterling ring from the south of France
- Gold signet ring my dad gave my mom when they were 18
- two meaningful sterling bands
Other hand:
- Sterling double-arched ring from Norway
- Sterling curved ring from Thailand
Liz Giardina photographed by Emily Weiss in New York on August 10th, 2012.