- In the decades since she earned her Master of Fine Arts from SMU, designer Julie Cohn has created jewelry that is now distributed throughout the US.

At the heart of her work is artistry.

She says, "I knew I always wanted to be an artist.

"I had plan A "and didn't even entertain anything else but plan A."

Today, we see her vision for jewelry and its role in fashion.

Jewelry always fits.

Today, on Fit 2 Stitch.

(upbeat music) - [Announcer] Fit 2 Stitch is made possible by Kai Scissors, Bennos Buttons, OC Sewing Orange County, Vogue Fabrics, Pendleton, Imitation of Life and Clutch Nails.

- You all know how much I love clothing.

What you don't know is how much I love jewelry.

And the reason I want Julie here today is because there are some things in life that you just learn through others.

I first saw her collection at a high-end specialty store here in Dallas.

I found out she was local and we got a chance to meet.

And I got a chance to get her on here.

I believe jewelry is an extension of our clothing.

I think sometimes I've had jewelry and I've designed a whole garment around it.

How did you even get into this?

- Accidentally, I've always made things.

I grew up making things.

I grew up doing crafts, handcrafts.

- And you have a Masters in Arts?

- Masters in Painting and Printmaking.

- Okay.

- And in the art world, you know, that it's really, really hard to support yourself and I did not want to teach.

And so I went the entrepreneurial route, which is, you know, we knew nothing and we made it up.

- Yeah.

- So, I've always had a creative business.

This is my third creative business.

Jewelry, anything fashion related was never on my radar at all.

I was more interiors related.

And, but always making things by hand.

Always things that showed the evidence of the hand.

I was not interested in a lot of...

In something that looked very manufactured.

- Sure.

- So that was sort of what I became known for.

- I think that's what attracts me to your jewelry.

It's clearly looks like one of a kind with every piece that I've seen.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

And it basically is.

- Yes.

- Yeah, it basically is.

- It's beautiful.

- Thank you.

- So you got into it.

What did you first start?

How did you first decide?

What did you wanna make first?

- This sort of an interesting precursor to all of this.

So I was in...

I'd gone to Italy to help a friend try and decorate this house, this beautiful house that they had rehabbed in Italy.

And when we were out in Tuscany and kind of in the middle of nowhere.

And there was an Army Navy supply of Italian remnants of army navy stuff and I found this was on a little rubber necklace and it's a piece of pyrite stone wrapped really coarsely with a piece of brass wire.

And I was like, I just, I love this.

This is so primitive.

- I actually do too.

- What the hell is it doing here?

Why would this even be here?

So I bought it and I wore it for years.

- How much was it?

- $10.

I didn't even know that much but there is an aspect of collage bringing unlike things together that is a big part of my aesthetic and has been through my entire career.

- So that's the goal for you?

- It's unlikely marriages.

Yeah.

(Peggy laughs) Including the one I'm in.

No-- - Is bringing unlikely things.

- I love humble materials that are elevated to a higher level of perception.

- Okay.

- I am, you know, as someone who loves fashion, I don't go out and wear, you know, really fancy clothes, but I am a high low person that is like because it's about the hunt.

And if I can find a fabulous pair of Thom Browne pants, The RealReal, and I get my shirt at Target and I have a great outfit, then that's all I care about.

- The jewelry tells the rest of the story.

- Yeah, yeah.

I mean, how I wear it and -- - I want you to tell me about this piece over here.

- Okay.

Okay.

- Because I think I find this piece, this especially, it seems to almost culminate what your story is.

- Well, this is what I would say about this piece in particular is that this is mother of pearl that's been hand drilled to look like a decayed leaf.

- So like every one of those are all gonna be different?

- They're all hand drilled.

Yeah.

My staff hates me because we do this all by hand.

Then one of my staff carved this in wax and it's cast in silver and then it's attached to the mother of pearl.

Then you've got a bronze bale and then you have an oxidized silver chain.

So it's a very much a collage of materials.

- Exactly what you're saying.

- That sort of creates this piece that wouldn't normally maybe have come together because you wouldn't have necessarily seen those materials used in that way.

We're actually piercing mother a pearl but it's a shape of a cameo.

I mean, it's a lot of, it's reference to old things, new things.

What's there, what's not there, which is the decay part.

- What's interesting is I grew up around the beach and a lot of the shells kind of almost look like that - Which I love that.

- So, to me when I immediately saw that, I thought that reminded me of the beach area.

- Yes totally.

- And then I love a paired... That's gotta be super duper pricey.

- This is probably the most, one of the most expensive things in the collection.

All of these, when I first made this necklace, I was just playing around with a very craft way of making jewelry which was with a product called metal clay that it starts out as clay and when you fire it, it becomes metal.

It centers into metal.

And it's actually very, you know, I mean, these could actually all be made out of metal clay and you would never know because it's very... - It actually looks like metal.

- It looks really great.

- Even though it's clay.

- So, I made the first one out of metal clay and as I got more involved in creating an actual jewelry line, I realized this is way too labor intensive so I really need to go to casting.

So I took one of the metal links that I had made in clay sent it to the caster.

They made a mold of it.

And so this is all cast and soldered together.

So each one of these pieces has to be, you know, it's cast, it's cleaned up.

It's then taken, you know, soldered together to make this necklace - It's such a classic.

I mean, to put it with a white blouse and jeans, it's just an amazing classic and it look so every day.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

- It's beautiful.

- This was a Roman chain.

- Tell me what that retails for because I really want everyone to know that it may be higher priced in your line, but in fact if you were to compare it to a gold necklace, it's not even close.

- It depends on where you get it but this is around 895.

So, I-- - And that's not 8,900.

- No, its not.

- That's $800.

- And the person I was doing a trunk show with last weekend had a necklace.

It was done very differently.

It was much more finesse not as primitive looking which this was supposed to be primitive.

- That's what I like about it.

- Yeah, it's very Roman.

It's called the Roman chain.

- Yeah.

- He had a necklace and had about the same kind of massing and his was $81,000.

- Yeah.

- And, you know, I mean, the thing that I love about my-- - You found the hole.

- Well, I found what has been so great for me is my niche in the market is that the person who bought that $81,000 item also may buy this and wear 'em together.

- Sure.

- So I have filled that hole in the market where it's considered fine jewelry because it's all artisan and yet it is not the price of fine jewelry.

- Exactly.

- So I can be a gift item for a high-end retailer.

I can be, you know, it's a little more of a no brainer.

- Well, I find you can't do wrong.

Tell me about this one because I just saw this paired with something completely different and-- - Well, I would put it with that white.

It looks great dressed up or dress down.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

And since I do so little dressing up, this actually's not even my shirt but I love the color so much.

I actually borrowed it from one of my employees.

This is so labor-intensive and this really uses all of the crafting techniques in one piece.

So you've actually got these beads.

Bronze tubing is not made except for industry.

- Okay.

- So, it's always brass and brass is a yellower color.

We wanted our alloy and what we use in metal which is very specific to look like 10 to 14 karat gold not 18.

'cause its a little yellower.

- I was gonna say I thought it was actually.

- I know.

I'm glad you did 'cause this would be like a Hellenistic color - Right.

- And it would be very expensive.

- Right.

- But, so these are actually extruded in clay, very time consuming.

These are all cut out of sheet metal.

Cut into the shape of the flower, hammered for their texture.

Then formed, hammered again to form the flower shape.

And these are all cast.

These are all...

This was made in wax.

The mold was made.

These are cast and they are riveted through.

- It's so beautiful and it's not heavy.

- No, it's not heavy.

- I think that's what's surprising to me.

The gold-- - 'Cause it's sheet.

- Yeah.

Gold would be much heavier.

- Well, if you even... A sheet of gold I can't even imagine what a sheet of gold is.

Gold is 18, ... 1830 an ounce - This is beautiful.

It just gives such a great look.

This is much more natural as well.

- Well, it is also...

I love primitive and I love primitive technique.

- Sure.

- So, my love of Grecian jewelry, of Egyptian jewelry, of all ancient jewelry.

You know, when I go to The Met, I will beeline it for all the early civilization jewelry because that is so inspiring to me.

- Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I love the layering.

I think you have four necklaces on here and they just look like they're made to go together.

- Yeah.

And they're also very different and all allude to different things.

So back to your beach story, I also collect tons of stuff from the beach and since I don't live near one, you know, I always relish the opportunity.

- You're by the lake.

- Yeah.

I'm by a Lake and there are no shells.

- Yeah.

- But there are great leaves.

There're awesome leaves.

So, this piece is actually all made out of clay.

And these are all colors that are mixed together to look like agate, to reference other stones but they are able to be handmade.

They're all one of a kind.

And so for me, this is kind of like a beautiful version of I made this a camp kind of necklace where you found your... Yeah.

Where you found your things and you wore all summer.

Not that I ever went to camp but that's my fantasy of what people at camp do.

And then, you know, this is really more like a sort of a classic, you know, pendant.

It looks like agate, but it is also clay.

- Yeah.

- So it's very lightweight.

Because of the price point that I sit in the market, I can not use certain kinds of materials that I would love to use because that's not where I sit in the marketplace.

- Right.

- So it is...

I never have money to throw at an idea.

I have ingenuity.

- That's even better.

- That has been for this entire story of every creative endeavor I've had so everything I do is very labor intensive but it is to elevate things to make them look as if they are really something else.

And I actually recently posted on Instagram.

I mean, early craftspeople worked with what they had and then as time went on, they became an antiquities.

And so this is what I have to work with but it totally transcends its origin.

- I wanna see more because some of this over here.

This is this bead you're talking about.

- Yeah.

I love this.

- This looks like black Onyx.

- I know.

I love this.

- Except that for me, I can't wear a black Onyx.

Well, you would because you'd have a backache at the end of the day.

- You do.

- Yeah.

This is like really light.

And I love it because it looks like it's marble.

- Oh and it's clay.

- It's clay.

It's clay.

So every bead, you know, you're rolling them out.

The tricky part of working with the clay is getting just that right amount of transparency, the right hues of color and working them together to create this sort of beautiful marbled effect and polishing gives it the final luster that brings out that luminosity.

But I absolutely think it, I know because I have some African necklaces that are that massive.

That they weigh a ton.

- Yeah.

- And so to make something and be able to do like this.

I love blue so much and to do a necklace like this that has all these sort of wonderful agate shades or Sydney Finestone reference and be able to control that, make it exactly the size that I need it, repeat it.

All of that is perfect for our studio.

- Could I tell you the details even where I love that these aren't straight and they again have that natural kind of crimp to them.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

- I just absolutely notice all these details.

So that's one of my favorites.

- Yeah, this is great.

I, you know, my husband is a landscape architect and for the first 30 years.

I think we've been together like 37 years that we've been together.

I never really thought about the fact that I live with this garden outside.

It's always in my peripheral vision.

So I just never thought about it.

And when we started working in sheet metal, I realized we could get all these incredibly beautiful objects out of sheet metal that we couldn't get for casting them.

And wouldn't it be cool 'cause I, you know, I love the reference of surrealism.

I love the combination of silver and bronze together.

- I do too.

And it's so popular in fashion everywhere today.

- Yeah.

- It's really popular.

- So, I think that, you know, you get this almost sculptural object that is a combination of craft.

This is fabricated.

This is cast.

And-- - The bug is very real and that what's casting?

- It's awesome.

I know.

I was gonna jump back but is that what the casting does?

Is it gets the... - No.

I mean, actually... Or it's just an easier way to do it?

- It's just much easier way to do it than to fabricate it.

Fabricate it would be cutting it all out of metal, soldering it together-- - Which is what this is, the basis?

- Yeah.

But that's cut out of one piece and then you're taking that piece, you're hammering it to give it texture.

Then you're full creasing it by how you hammer it and how it begins to fold and roll over on itself.

- So these people know what they're doing?

- Yeah.

They do.

They do.

- But you had to do all the beginning.

- This is sort of, it's been an interesting stage in my life of having my own business which is that, you know, I'm not as dextrous as I used to be.

And so I, my skills and I have a familial tremor that has happened since I've gotten older.

So my ability to control my hand skills in that level is really going far away.

- But the good news is you're the inspiration and they can just do it.

- And I can sit.

And I have incredible people in my staff who, you know, we all bring something different to the conversation.

My staff is almost all my staff is from Arts Magnate high school.

So part of the business that I've been in my entire career is mentoring younger people, younger artists to have a career in the arts in some way, in some fashion.

- Because you understand how difficult that is.

You understand how difficult that journey is.

- Yeah.

- I saw your workshop and I saw that it's heaven.

It's just absolute heaven.

- It is actually.

- The environment, everything.

And you said it.

You said something to me that really resounded was that you want your life to be-- - Art.

- Artful.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

- And all your surroundings and everything.

- Yeah.

- You really want that inspiration and I see that.

Tell me about this.

- This is... Now these are a combination of different stones and beads.

These are pearls.

There's a labradorite in here.

These are bronze beads that are clay.

It's kind of what I would say is sort of like a melange but yeah, it's just so beautiful on black.

- It is.

- I'm all about the black on black texture.

I love that.

I love the way black on black looks.

This piece is also very labor intensive.

This is all fabricated.

So this is one piece that is cut in this shape.

- It's like a link necklace done completely differently.

- Yeah.

- But it's so unique and how it's done.

- Yeah.

It's a link necklace and I think it's called the lunar link.

And so it has this very sort of-- - So who comes up with those cool names?

- Oh, I hate naming things.

- That's a pretty cool name.

- That's a staff's job.

- No, it's my job and we always, every time we have to do it.

- That's a lunar link.

That's a great name for that.

- Yeah but it is.

It's lunar because it looks like, you Know, phases of the moon.

- It does.

- And everyone's a little bit different.

- Yeah.

So no.

Naming is always like one of my least... Buying appliances and naming my jewelry collection are two things I hate.

- So where does inspiration like that come from?

- I'm a lover of old prints and old graphics.

I was a printmaker, but I just love old engravings.

And so, you know, I collect for a variety of reasons a lot of different things like that.

So it may be that I, you know, have probably pinned to some Pinterest board a lunar chart.

And so I, you know, played with that idea in a variety.

Actually, the first time I thought of doing something like that, I was working with a ceramicist and we were gonna do like an ombre plate in porcelain that had that sense of a lunar, you know, half waxing waning moon.

And we never could make it come together for production.

So, you know, here it resurfaces.

It's a necklace now.

- And whenever I talk with designers and I love talking to them because your brain just works in a way that is so beneficial if everyone could just tap into it.

But what I notice is that often and the reason I asked you specifically is a lot of people will say, I'll say, " How do you, "where do you get your inspiration?"

I'll say," Oh, everywhere."

But I don't wanna know everywhere.

I wanna know specific - Specifically.

Okay.

- Like the leaves.

And you said like the prints that you're looking at were it's a lunar moon.

And that's where your mind shifted from there to there.

I think for all of us that's just so beneficial because what you're saying is it's all here.

We just have to see it in a little different way.

- Well and to that end, I look at a lot of modern art.

And I would say this is really an homage to Ellsworth Kelly who I love, who did a whole series of line drawings and plants that have been incredibly influential to me.

And I think about them a lot when I'm in the studio.

- Sure.

So then you can say also expose yourselves to everything.

- everything.

- And then pick out.

- And travel is, you know, even if I go away for two days, if I get recharged by one thing I see on the road or just it's like this massive, for younger people You won't know what this is, but used to be called a Rolodex.

(Peggy laughing) It's sort of a visual Rolodex in my brain of just stuff.

It's like, you know, it's like a bingo cage.

Just all swirling around in there.

So, you know, to talk about specifically so I would pick this up and say, actually I got this in Round Top, but I had seen them in Portugal.

And it's like, I think it's called a scapulary or something.

It's a little folded piece of leather that is stitched together with some Italian on it which I can't read.

But that ended up becoming the inspiration for the Mevia earring which is a folded piece of hammered bronze.

- It's beautiful.

- That is then dotted from the back with a fine tool and riveted together.

So it's like a pocket of metal.

And Mevia was the goddess that was a gladiator and fought with the shield.

And I think that there you can see this like is across the board just like an array of references.

So, you know, my homage to Catholicism.

I'm Jewish but I love their stuff.

They're way great clothes and stuff.

Spiders, there's something that I just love about this.

It's again it's turn that surrealist reference like Elsa Schiaparelli or something.

- Do you design your earrings to go with?

Do you think earrings can stand on their own?

- Oh, totally.

Totally.

Like these, I wear these every day.

The edition is up for them but because I wear glasses, it's hard for me to wear a lot of big earrings.

So this is like, I just don't even take these out.

- It's who you are.

- Yeah.

It's like an... Actually that is the Holy grail as a jewelry designer is to make the thing you never wanna take off.

That's like, you know, I'll be doing that for the rest of my life.

- And I think that that's also it takes a while to get to that position.

So I think it's not about figuring it all out when we're 20 and 30.

I think it really does take all those experiences together.

- I think it does too.

And I think as you get older, you want less, you need less and you want those things to be more important than rather than landfill.

And there's a lot of landfill out there and jewelry is in it.

Everything else is in it too.

And-- - I don't want my jewelry in the landfill.

- No, I don't want mine there either.

This is actually really interesting how I did this.

I got really interested in drawing with wax on a piece of glass.

So this is actually drawn with wax.

It's drawn flat in the shape of the cuff.

Then I send it and have a mold made.

They cast it in bronze.

Then they form it into the shape of the cuff.

Then they recast it in the cuff.

So, but I love the quality, because I love line work, this is all about line work but it's also about my love of the ocean of, you know, coral and fan coral.

- I was gonna say when I first saw it, it even reminded me of coral.

- Well, I actually have.

I can never remember my stuff.

I've done so many different pieces so I can't remember, but I think this is the, it is a coral cuff.

There's like two or three designs that are called like one the fan coral cuff.

And this is the sea, sea coral.

I can't remember.

- This looks like fan coral - Yeah, it does look like fan coral - Again being from Florida, I had this like fan coral in my house.

So did gravitate from that.

You choose what you really love and what you love is really-- - But it's a juxtaposition of that that is the most interesting to me.

It is the juxtaposition of my inspiration of Ellsworth Kelly with Elsa Schiaparelli or something.

And I just... That is where I live my life at that juncture of fine art, of things that are organic, my environment.

I don't leave my house that much.

My environment is-- - (mumbles) it's all there.

- So, you know, it's so important to me and with my husband doing the outside and I do the inside.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

I mean.

- Well and that's exactly what I wanted to do.

I really wanted you to hear where inspiration comes from because literally it comes from our environment.

And so it really makes us think about where are we living and what are we doing and what really do we want our environment to be.

And that taking control of our environment, we can do, we can't just deal with clothing.

We can deal with so much more.

After trying for months with no luck to contact one of Beyonce's stylist, Sai Sankoh got the surprise of a lifetime when she saw pictures of Beyonce wearing one of her shirt dresses.

Will meet Sai Sankoh when she joins us as our guest designer next time on Fit 2 Stitch.

(orchestral music) - [Announcer] Fit 2 Stitch is made possible by Kai Scissors, Bennos Buttons, OC Sewing Orange County, Vogue Fabrics, Pendleton, Imitation of life and Clutch Nails.

To order a four DVD set of Fit 2 Stitch series nine, please visit our website at fit2stitch.com.