March 17, 2024In the more than 20 years since Faye Kim first took up her goldsmith tools, she’s amassed a shelf full of awards, established a reputation for producing highly wearable, heirloom-quality jewels and acquired a devoted following of collectors, many of whom have purchased her work from the beginning. So, her inability to truly consider herself a designer is hard to understand. “I still don’t think of myself that way,” she says. Profound humility, despite indisputable success, is obviously part of the explanation. But more than that, Kim never expected that jewelry design would be her destiny until it was.
As an undergrad, she dutifully pursued an economics degree to meet the expectations of her immigrant parents, and she worked for her father’s accounting office for a time. But she quickly found herself “restless,” yearning to do something more creative. Kim’s mother, having always supported her daughter’s creativity, encouraged her to attend the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) in New York as a way to address her impulse for change. A friend’s son had done the same. Kim says she “jumped at the chance and fell in love with learning about gems.”
As a newly minted graduate, Kim hopscotched from a job at a jewelry wholesaler to become a pearl buyer for Tiffany & Co. She eventually became a jewelry buyer at the luxury department store Bergdorf Goodman, where she was exposed to the work of modern masters like Angela Cummings and Barry Kieselstein-Cord and to antique treasures from Kentshire.
Many of the designers she encountered pursued their craft despite what could be a challenging environment for independent creatives. “What struck me is how difficult it was for small designers to really get any kind of exposure or presence,” she says.
Those barriers didn’t affect her love for jewelry making, and when she downshifted professionally to focus on her family, she enrolled in classes as a hobby. The process enthralled her. “I loved being at the bench. I could sit there for hours on end,” Kim says. “I fell in love with the granulation process and making everything by hand.” She immediately gravitated to working with 18-karat gold, especially in an alloy with a subtle green cast.
That hobby was salvation for Kim as a young mother who needed a creative outlet. When she decided to return to work, in 2003, she opened an eponymous boutique in downtown Westport, Connecticut, a bedroom community outside New York City, and it became her livelihood.
Kim established her stylistic signatures early on, catering to clients who she says “appreciate individuality.” Single pieces are weighty enough to hold their own but not too big to stack with others for a more imposing look, modern silhouettes are combined with old-world techniques like granulation and bezel setting, and virtually everything bearing her name is made entirely by artisans in her studio. Her team attends to details large and small. “We make the hinge mechanisms in the jewels,” Kim notes. “The chain is pulled by hand.”
The Daisy ring, a large floral cocktail piece comprising a halo of gemstone petals around a central stone, is a favorite, whether featuring diamond slices or multicolored collages of gems. Sizable dome rings are also much loved. And a stack composed of a gemstone ring flanked by gold bands is another mainstay for Kim’s true believers. Earrings dangling perfectly proportioned baroque-pearl or diamond drops that softly sway from hinged mountings are bestsellers. All make a significant impression without being overbearing.
One of Kim’s top priorities as a designer is creating pieces that work with what her customers already have. “I want clients to be able to create their own look with the jewelry,” she says, “to mix and match without clashing with other pieces they own.”
For those who want to rework pieces from their jewelry collections or incorporate gems from their personal cache into one of her designs, or who seek a custom piece, Kim has established a robust bespoke business, too. “Whatever the term is — recycling, upcycling — I’ve been doing that for twenty years,” she says.
Kim attracts clients with widely different visions of adornment, from those she describes as “meticulous minimalists who dress in The Row” to haute bohemian types who “can’t pile on enough” of her pieces. Both extremes (and everyone in between) will no doubt be clamoring for the anniversary collection she introduced to mark two decades since she started her business. Available on 1stDibs, it’s a blockbuster assortment of exceptionally precious pieces that riff on some of her best-known silhouettes while introducing new ideas into the mix.
After hewing to a largely neutral palette, Kim has used the collection as an opportunity to adopt lashings of color, deploying a trove of colored stones she acquired years ago. They crop up in offerings like elongated pendants with rose-cut sapphires, rings sporting cushion-cut aquamarines flanked by diamond baguettes and a necklace composed of gumball-size electric-green peridot beads. “So many of us have our basic staples already,” she says. “Now, we need a pop of color and happiness, something that makes us smile.”
She’s also explored platinum to a significant degree for the first time. The tactile quality of the metal appeals to her. “It has real weight — that gravitas that you understand when you put on a piece of jewelry,” she says. “That’s what I love.” Especially in the matte finish she prefers, platinum has a vastly different presence from gold. “It’s kind of industrial. The fine gems really contrast nicely with it,” she says. Some of the most striking pieces in the collection are hefty bezel-set solitaire rings with zero embellishment. Mammoth tanzanites and Zambian emeralds framed by gleaming platinum supply drama aplenty.
The anniversary collection contains some of the boldest pieces Kim has created. It also marks the beginning of a fresh chapter in her story, especially now that she has shuttered her original boutique to work with clients by appointment in a new private studio space. She’s setting the groundwork for focusing on designs that challenge and excite her, even if their higher prices and larger scale make them a gamble.
“I try to be true to myself. And I think that has been my saving grace,” Kim says. “I don’t follow trends — I can’t afford to. And as I get older, I feel better about myself. I feel more confident in doing the things that I truly love.”
