Tell us about Pieces of Them.
Our brand, Pieces of Them, is an all women led and owned jewellery brand who launched in May 2023. Our jewellery pieces are made with high quality .925 sterling silver and 14ct gold vermeil, designed by both of the owners (Lilly & Nat) and handcrafted sustainably in Bali, Indonesia. Our designs are mostly inspired by streetwear, tattoos, music and the ocean.
We started the brand as we felt there was a gap in the market where gender neutral, chunky, streetwear style jewellery wasn’t being made or marketed to women.
We ourselves have worn this style of jewellery for years, however never were able to find designs that we really loved or had a unique spin on it.
The founders, Lilly (28) & Natalie (33), are partners in not only business, but also in life.
We met online (during covid) as Lilly lived in Perth and Nat lived in Queensland. We finally met in person 3 years ago, where we lived on the Gold Coast for 7 months before deciding to sell everything we owned, packed up our lives and lived in a van while travelling Australia for 5 months.
We made it to Perth and loved the coast line, beaches and lifestyle so much, we decided to stay. Once covid slowed down we travelled to Bali and got inspired by the incredibly talented craftsman making jewellery – which is how Pieces of Them became an idea and has now grown into our business!
What inspired you to start Pieces of Them?
After years of wearing chunky, streetwear style jewellery, we could never find pieces that we truly loved. We also noticed a lot of existing brands were either male dominated or at a high price point. We wanted to close the gap in the market for unique designs and affordability.
During one trip to Bali we came across the incredibly talented jewellery craftsman and this is what started our journey in designing our own pieces and having them come to life by them.
Tell us about your career and background.
Natalie has worked in corporate and sales for 10+ years before she met Lilly.
Lilly was working in corporate and hospitality for around the same amount of time.
During covid we decided to quit our jobs and travel in a van – this is where our entrepreneurship blossomed. We began finding ways to make money while on the road, first via social media then once we made it to Perth, we started our own events business. This business boomed but eventually we fell out of love with it and decided to sell the business.
This is when we started exploring jewellery designing and how Pieces of Them came to life.
We both have an entrepreneurial mindset and once we quit our 9-5’s we knew we didn’t want to go back to working for someone else. We both have a passion for creativity although we’ve never studied or have a background in that avenue – we knew we wanted our business to involve being creative!
Describe a typical work day for you.
A typical work day for us involves a morning sweat sesh at our hot pilates studio before heading into our home office for a meditation before getting started with work.
We then get started on our admin tasks, replying to emails, checking stock and then moving on to the fun part – packing orders and designing new collections. A new collection can typically take anywhere from 1-3 months from the initial design process to the release stage, which means we are always working on new designs so we can constantly bring out new collections.
Each collection is exclusive and only has limited pieces made, which is why we strive to release new collections on a regular basis.
Then we finish the day with our social media side of things, including creating content and posting for both our instagram and tiktok accounts.
What advice do you have for those wanting to start a business?
Do your research and make sure you start a business you’re passionate about, because when times get tough (and they will when you run your own business), you will need something more than just the money that keeps you going!
Also, be prepared to not make much money at the beginning, so the best piece of advice would be to keep your full time or part time job while you’re building your own business.
What’s next for you, and Pieces of Them?
We are currently designing our third collection which is inspired by the ocean and we are hoping to release it in early March. Our future hopes are to release a new collection every 1-2 months and we are also working on adding apparel to our brand.
The dream would be to be a well-known, established, worldwide brand!