Our 2011 Winter Sale

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Click Here to Shop Our Website

It has been a very long time since we posted to this blog and I hate to start the new year with a blog which is basically an advertisement but hey, you should know when we have a 20% off sale, right?  Actually it is doubly great for our customers because not only are giving 20% of the price of in stock pieces but we are giving the discount on prices which we established before silver and gold went through the roof! 

At the moment we are working on a lot of new designs for the upcoming catalog release, but in the mean time take advantage of these really great prices.  Remeber it is the same quality our customers have come to love, but at great savings.

Thanks for the visit.  Be Well.

Jim

2010 Holly Snowflake has just Arrived

We have completed the first production run on the 2010 Holly Snowflake design and all models are now available. This year's theme is based on the Holly Tree, which has been a yuletide symbol for centuries. Check out a previous post on how we design the snowflakes or visit our website at http://www.breakell.com/.

Pendants Ship For Free!

Our new collection will be out soon but in the meantime we're offering free shipping on all of our pendants. Click here and go to our website for details.

All of our pendants are handcrafted in our workshop in Newport RI and are available at our website, our store at 128 Spring St. and by phone; 800 767 6411.

Earring Sale 15% off Til August 23rd!

We have just posted a really good sale on all of our handcrafted earrings' gold and silver. Go to JH Breakell Website for details of this really sweet offer.

Looks like snow

The sun is shining, a warm breeze carries the salt smell of the bay and I am thinking about snow. Individual snowflakes to be more specific. Every summer the process of making the Annual J H Breakell Snowflake begins again. The first and most important question is “What’s the central theme?” Join me for a brief trip in the way-back machine into the Breakell vault for a little background on how we started making snowflakes and why each one has a theme.

In the mid 70’s, with a few years of silversmithing under his belt, Jim was looking for companies to showcase his work. Aiming high, he found success at world renowned Cartier in New York and for a few years their Fifth Avenue store carried his sterling belt buckle and snowflake designs. Fast forward, past frustration with wholesaling his work, a brief stint working for luxury leather goods company, Trafalgar Ltd, the beginnings of a mail order business in our home basement and, finally, to our Mill Street shop in Newport.

By then we had a small catalog and in 1992 we featured two of Jim’s old snowflake designs as pins. Another of Jim’s snowflake pin designs appeared almost every winter thereafter but it wasn’t until 1999 that we had our Aha! Moment. Some folks were predicting doom and others were planning parties but everyone was pretty excited about the approaching Millennium. By then I had taken over designing the snowflakes and I used the Roman numeral two thousand, MM, as the pattern for the new Snowflake ‘99 Pin. To appeal to a wider audience than just pin wearers, which I am not, we decided to make it a Christmas Tree Ornament as well. Eureka! Before you could say Merry Christmas, all the old snowflakes were made into ornaments and The Snowflake Collection was born.

Since then, I’ve worked out each year’s pattern using the iconography of Christmas, winter or New England. Trees, stars, peace doves, snow angels, sailboats and even the state of Rhode Island have found their way into the pattern of a snowflake over the years. So now, as the sun shines and the beach beckons, I am back to thinking about snow and all the images we associate with winter and Christmas. A real snowflake reflects the natural symmetry and extravagance of nature and nothing more. Who needs a theme when there’s not another one the same among billions. But we have always liked to tell stories with our work and every year since 1999 we’ve done that with the new snowflake. It’s up to you to recognize the pattern. Bells and Holly are front runners for the theme this year. It’s decision time.

Joan Breakell

What We've Been Up To

We have just made available a small collection of new designs on our website and catalog. One of my favorites is a necklace with either 8mm serpentine beads in a beautiful yellowy green or very simple cable link chain. The unusal clasp, which we developed, features two intertwining hearts. We call it the “Heart To Heart” necklace.

Check out this and other new designs in the Jewelry Specials section of our online store and for a short time we giving free Priority Mail shipping with any order containing a “New Arrivals”.

Why I Don't Do The Boogaloo No Mo

JH Breakell and Company has been through a lot in over thirty years of business, but in the mid-1990s we came up against our biggest challenge--one that forced us to make some fundamental changes. My eyesight started to degenerate due to a genetic condition known simply as PXE (short for pseudoxanthoma elasticum). Over time PXE causes your vision, especially close-up vision, to deteriorate to the point where you literally cannot see what is in front of you, only what is to the side or periphery!


Naturally I could no longer work directly at my craft, much less drive a car or read a book. But you know vision loss did have some funny benefits, despite the grief I felt. I spent more time organizing the way we ran the business end of JH Breakell. I ensured that our silversmiths learned as much as possible because I could no longer “do it all” anymore. Finally, my wife Joan, who was also my business partner, was able to (well, had to) jump into the creative end of things in ways she never dreamed (see Joan's previous blog post “Put me in, Coach”).


So as my fine vision wound down, I gradually moved from chief designer, model maker and master craftsman to business manager and CEO of JH Breakell & Co. My time was no longer divided and I could focus on building the business. The last piece I designed and made from scratch--I took it from a pencil sketch to ready-to-wear jewelry--was the Downwind Pin. It’s still in the line and going strong. While I'm not able to create sketches and models myself anymore, I still work closely with Joan and the rest of the team to come up with new design ideas. So we continue to create pieces in the distinctive style JH Breakell has been developing since 1972. And in my new role, I've been able to move the company forward with new tools like the website (and this blog).

Sometimes change can be cataclysmic and positive at the same time.