Spirit of X-Mas

Thank you to our 600 Christmas shoppers coming on the 6F of Wellington Street!!! We had a blast seeing everybody as Real Christmas spirit cannot be found online!
Laur Meyrieux was in the mood for sipping mulled wine meanwhile Leyla Bouzouba
enjoy some Dim Sum... Even Mabel Wong came to help me out while fixing her flat.  We all got our Christmas gifts done while presenting Marijoli's collection.
Thanks to Neveen Aziz, Kelly Berlin and Marc-David Nathan to look after all of us on this Happy Shopping day!

with one of our favorite stylist - Tina Leung

Even Joel Robuchon managed to stop by before heading to Noodle Me

Private Sale

Hoohohoooo!

Christmas parties are always a ton of fun. Celebrating the holiday season is something that most people look forward to all year. Getting together with family and friends, enjoying the winter white surroundings, getting warm and cozy by the fire, and enjoying with relish a variety of treats and delicious dishes. Come and celebrate with us a hot chocolate or a glass of wine during our private sale. Marielle will guide you to find the most exquisite XMas gift for your special one or just for yourself.



 
Location : Kee Club
Time : from 11-8pm
Date : 26 of November




Why girls engage those terrible friendship wars?


 Mothers of daughters often dread the advent of the friendship wars. "Uh oh, here it is," they often think as they see their daughter come home crying from school for the first time because another girl called her "a name". Most mothers don't want to remember the pain of those years, and if they do, they certainly want to protect their daughters from what they suffered; so they try to minimize it for their daughter. "So what?" they may say. "What do you care what she says? Don't let it bother you." Yet mothers find themselves often quite helpless in this situation it's one of the first signs that they cannot control the world for their growing daughters. "Should I call that horrible girl's mother?" they ask themselves. They would love to protect their child from the exclusion of being the one girl who is not invited to the popular girls' party. And they may ask, "What do I do if my daughter chooses girls who I think are undermining her confidence?" And, "Why is my strong-minded daughter so influenced by her friends?"

 Girls' friendships are passionate, but they are also painful

Why is it girls' friendships that are so often troubled that teachers and school counsellors note that much of their non academic work with adolescent girls is about friendship struggles dilemmas that they also feel perplexed about how to handle. "Girls are in my office all day complaining about each other," said one middle school principal. "One day one's feelings are hurt. The next day it's another. I wish I knew how to make this easier for them." A school counsellor remarked, "The girls aren't violent as often as boys, but they take their fights more personally, and argue more, and come to us constantly about their problems with other girls. It's really hard to help them."
Well, what I say about girls' and women's friendships may also be true of many male friendships: certainly, in the early years, for both boys and girls, play with other kids is a major social enterprise. But friendship is clearly experienced - and performed - differently for girls and for boys. By the age of four, girls and boys segregate themselves when they play with peers and when they form friendships. Girls choose girls; boys choose boys. If boys try to join a group of girls, they usually mean to cause trouble. If a girl tries to join a group of boys, she is very likely to be rejected. This segregation seems to be universal - across culture and class, and occurs - especially in a school context, even when the adults try to mix the children. Boys and girls like playing with different things, and they also have very different play styles, and distinctive cultures emerge in all-girls groups and in all-boy groups. Boys are more "physical" in their play that girls, and engage in a good deal of roughhousing. They form more obvious, and more stable, hierarchies, and engage more directly in competition with one another (fifty per cent of the play time, versus one per cent of girls' play time). Girls sustain long, turn-taking conversations more often than boys. More often than boys, girls express agreement with a friend's suggestions. When they make suggestions of their own, they often add a tag question (shall we? should we?) Boys are more likely to use direct imperatives: ` give me, put it there', or prohibitions: `don't do that', `get away from that'.


Gold memory from Cannes Festival

Conflict in girls' groups can also go unnoticed because it is usually indirect: the competition is for the more nebulous good of popularity (not, as in boys' games who can throw furthest, who's the strongest); but who is best liked, who's most likeable, or popular, or who is closer to the girl whom everyone likes. The chief commodity in the girls' community is intimacy. Girls monitor their friendships for subtle shifts in alliances, and they seek to be friends with popular girls. Popularity is a kind of status, but it also brings problems. Popular girls were often disliked because they can be envied, they can be the target of gossip, and they can be considered stuck up. Because the most important thing in girls' friendship is intimacy, they cannot have masses of friends, and so a popular girl, who attracts lots of other girls, must reject some of those girls in order to preserve the intimacy in the relationships she has. This makes her seem to others stuck up.
Popularity is dangerous, too, because it is transient. Girls' hierarchies are much less stable than those of boys', and so girls' are acutely aware of subtle nuances of inclusion and exclusion. Girls' emphasis on closeness and intimacy and understanding - does not always lead to nice and thoughtful behaviour. Such concern about intimacy arouses envy and anxiety. Alienating tactics - excluding someone from play, and spreading negative gossip about a girl, increase sharply with age, and such tactics are almost never mentioned by boys. This buried conflict causes girls' enormous pain - yet friendships are too important to give up, just because they often hurt. Learning to negotiate the pitfalls of friendship begins to seem the core of existence to the growing girl: the potential for rejection, alongside the dependence, makes friendships both powerful and dangerous - but few girls, or women, would give them up: many say, "I don't know who I'd be without my friends."

Interview for Kee Club Magazine






1. Your jewelry caught my eye at the Liberatum Arts Festival when you were wearing a simple necklace and bracelet.  You mentioned that you started production because so many people liked the pieces you created as gifts for your friends. Can you tell me how you turned the idea of Marijoli jewelry into reality?


As you mentioned, I was already producing the pieces for myself as I struggled to find jewellery that I really adored and were affordable. So it was really a case of scalability; and therefore finding a production partner that I could trust. I worked with factories in Japan initially, but surprisingly it was a challenge to achieve the level of quality that I needed with Japanese producers. I then used a family contact to launch production with a factory in Thailand. Once production was organized I set about trying to grow the brand recognition, I did a series of launch parties in Japan with other designers I respected, and worked with Miss Universe Japan, as a stylist…. [smiling] Obviously my jewellery was always top of my recommendations… 



2. You were born and educated in Switzerland and moved to Japan to start your atelier in 2005 where the brand Marijoli was created.  You are also a tremendous traveler and avid diver.  What influenced you to relocate to Japan and how have your travels and diving experiences shaped your jewelry?


Japan was an opportunity offered to my husband with his work. He wasn’t keen, but I motivated him to go as it felt somehow part of our destiny to be there. We married late and moving to Japan meant that we were able to start afresh as a new couple. When I arrived I worked out of our apartment which had an amazing view of Mount Fuji and the Tokyo skyline. I also started training to be a yoga instructor. As a result, my first work was very zen and the theme of simplicity has been maintained throughout my later creations. Diving became a part of my life on our honeymoon in the Maldives and later in Palau which is one of the seven wonders of the diving world. The underwater world had a large influence on what I did, as I drew on natures wonderful and basic architecture witnessed in much of the plant life, particularly coral.



4. What are your favorite materials to work with?

A stone is always a very personal thing, and I really enjoy working with clients to find the stone that ‘speaks’ to them when working on bespoke pieces.




5. Can you tell me the secret of modern elegance?

Good question! It’s something we are all after and it’s my goal to always observe and stay close to my customers and find out what makes them shine. There is no general answer to this question, but we all have the potential for it in our own individual way. [Eyes lighting up] I can help you find  it.



6. You aim to work on materials that can be recycled and not re-sold.  Sustainability issues seem to be at the forefront of the media today; can you discuss your views on this in regards to the jewelry industry?

 The industry has always been fond of recycling. Obviously that will always be the case with high value base materials. Gold mining and Diamond mining come with environmental and social problems, but even if everybody in jewellery production aimed to use recycled products, that would not stop the mining of gold and Diamonds. On a positive note, on a few occasions, I have had someone come to me with something that has sentimental value, but is not to their taste asking that I create something new for them using the components.




7. Many of your designs feature a coral style pattern that captures negative space.  Did you learn this method during your studies at University of Art and Design Lausanne in Switzerland, or did you develop it in Japan?

My degree gave me a base that I could build and evolve from, I like to think that I retain the practicality of industrial design in all of my work.




 11. Jewelry is passed down from generation to generation, and the most treasured pieces have often been inherited from loved ones.  Can you give me some insight into how you feel having a child will affect both your work and your collection?

The new trend is ‘push gifts’. A natural evolution of the inheritance process will be a passing on of the push gift to the relevant child. I don’t think having a child will much affect my designs, essentially I try to achieve a balance of elegance with modern style, so fashion and its evolution are very important.




12. You’re pieces are very personal, however with celebrities such as Madonna and Kate Moss wearing your designs sometimes it is hard to retain this.  How do you plan to preserve the private aura of your jewelry?


I have two lines. Marijoli which is what you find on our online boutique principally made of sterling silver and plated in either gold or rhodium and produced in larger quantities while Marielle Byworth is the brand for masterpieces and bespoke work. MB is the ‘fine jewelry’ line and is only available on private order. In that way we can individualize and preserve the aura of our creation.



13. Marijoli designs cater to many different markets.  In your opinion what is the biggest difference between Asian and European consumers of your designs?

 I would say that is not a big difference for us as we tend to reach a certain type of clients that have the same taste and habit and lifestyle. The brand is for girls with individual style, and the confidence to wear it.





14. The 9th Muse is very similar to your brand, modern yet elegant at the same time.  It is a fabulous platform for jewelers to showcase and sell their designs.  How were you first introduced to Jing and Charlotte from the company?

I heard of the shop while ago before it opened from a friend of Charlotte called Piecco Pang and then I met Jing at a private party. We had a quick chat and met again in their shop…We clicked and decided to give it a try for this summer.



15. You mentioned that you would like to extend the collection to bags, belts and accessories.  Are there any designs in the works?

I used to do a lot of collaboration in the past with fashion designers, and artists. One of particular prominence was the swimwear collection branded Ma&Ma which was a way for me to experiment with different mediums and widen my offering. Since moving to Hong Kong I have refocused on jewellery, as I think there is so much to do in it and I want to give our beautiful women a chance to shine



16. What is next for the Marijoli brand?

Most likely a branded shop front, or at least a studio with a show room. Location is difficult though as I need to be able to disconnect from the intense energy of Hong Kong.



Images by Lucy Mc Nally
Words by Dervla Louli

MM Necklace - Private order



Pink gold 18k with diamonds




Interview for the Swiss Business Hub



1. What is your business and how long have you been in operation?

We are a jewellery design and manufacture firm specializing in fashion jewellery and bespoke one off pieces. Marijoli has been doing business since early 2005, so we are into our eighth year in operation.

2. When did you set-up in Hong Kong?

We set up in HK after moving from Japan in late 2009. Following the end of the financial crisis, surprisingly started to see the demise of the expat community there, so the move was logical.

3. Why did you set-up here?

Hong Kong is actually a far more cosmopolitan market than Japan, and as such a far better fit for Marijoli and particularly the bespoke line. People like to cause a stir when they enter a room in Hong Kong... Tokyo is quite the opposite.

4. Do you feel that Hong Kong is a good place to start a business?

Hong Kong is a great place to start a business. Thanks to the British framework that surrounds much of Company legal infrastructure, it is a very simple and transparent place to set up a company.

5. What have been the advantages and opportunities here that you may not have had in Switzerland?

Switzerland has a lot of onerous employment costs, whereas Hong Kong is a lot more flexible, again mirroring the UK. Although I do miss the long lunches.



6. What types of challenges have you encountered doing business here?

The biggest challenge here has being trying to negotiate with the Chinese factories, which has been extremely difficult. We have had some bad experiences and as a result moved the majority of production to Thailand, which for similar pricing is much higher quality.

7. Upon reflection of your own journey, what are the top three key business tips that you could give colleagues in Switzerland who wish to come to Hong Kong to try their hand at starting a business here?

Just come and do it! It is so easy.If you need to negotiate with the Chinese, get a Chinese partner in the enterprise. Finding someone you can trust can be hard. Invest time in training your team. Cantonese people are extremely efficient if they are clear on what they are supposed to be doing. Take a little extra time making that investment.

Rejuvenation


Most people don’t realize that every piece of jewellery even the most expensive ages and degenerates with time. Everyday activities can damage your jewellery. It doesn’t take a hard bump to damage the claw or setting and leave your diamond or gemstone exposed to chipping, breaking or falling out.
  • Your diamonds can come loose when the piece is dropped, gets knocked against your kitchen tiles or in between plates while washing up, or is bumped against any hard surface.
  • The claws may get pulled off the diamonds or gemstones after being caught on a piece of clothing or in between shopping bags.
  • You might be at the gym and accidently bump the exercise equipment or weights.
  • Gardening or physically intensive jobs and activities can loosen the stones in their settings.
This why I started to REJUVENATE jewellery starting with my friend who were so afraid to tell her husband that she lost a diamond on her ring after a night out in Cave des Rois in St Tropez...


...Or recycling all the left over jewellery from your ex-boyfriend into a new necklace. Here is an example that I made this week with a ring that had a missing diamond.

Emerald ring REJUVENATED into a fresh yellow gold look!