How Missoma Went From The Kitchen Table To A Global Jewellery Brand | SheerLuxe Conversations

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0:45Do make sure to subscribe if you like what you hear. Hello, I'm Georgie Corrig-Cole, Shearlax's founder and CEO, and welcome to the Shearlax podcast. We are talking about the original brand influencer collaboration. I am joined by the wonderful Marisa Holden, the founder of Missimate Jewellery, and Lucy Williams, well, one of the most loved content creators in the UK. You sort of broke the internet when you launched that collection. Did we? Yes. How they continue to work together so well. It's a real relationship behind the scenes. and you know obviously Lucy's so involved in the designing as well it's not just oh sign something off at the end you know there are emails there are whatsapp groups there are there are a lot of meetings a lot of meetings what's new what's coming up their favorite pieces I'm still trying to get a toe ring over the line you know yeah Georgie we'll get you there don't you just just you wait no you will not no you I will I will don't miss it it's a good one

1:52Today we are joined by two women who helped redefine jewellery and the influencer brand relationship. In 2007 Marisa Horden launched Missima from her kitchen table turning a childhood passion for gemstones into a globally recognised brand and in 2015 Lucy Williams became Missima's very first collaborator, a partnership that has really set the standard for influencer brand collaborations. Together, they've not only shaped Missiman Stories, but many others for brands and content creators, not to mention the incredible jewellery they've given us as consumers to wear along the years. Welcome, ladies.

2:33Thank you. What a lovely interview. This is really fun. We started off by saying, before we went live, someone said, can you give us a, this is for our behind the scenes episode that's being filmed today. Can you give us a bit of spiel about why you're here? And I said, well, we started our businesses at similar times. Basically 18 years ago as well. We're literally the same kind of age. I know. And you had a very brief stint in the early days of your career. You ditched us and went to Marie Claire, I think. Yeah, I did. In style. In style. Which is no more. Right, in style. I know. I was trying to remember what year I worked here.

3:10was it 2010? That's a long... Isn't that amazing when you think that InStyle and all those publications and now it's sheer lux and it's the big broadcasters. I mean, how the industry has changed over those 10 years. I know, it's mad, isn't it? You two are still working together and we were chatting over lunch and you were saying it's 10 years that we've been working with Lucy. And anyway, we were like this is perfect, we need to talk about this story because you really were the first. I loved it you actually got that. You took the world by storm. I remember it so vividly. Can we go back to the early days?

3:44Let's start with you, Marisa, and that kitchen table business that you started with your mother and your sister, I seem to remember. Well, with my mum and my sister, mainly my mum. I mean, my sister would kind of come in and out and help out, and I still rely on them both so much for their aesthetic and their advice. And actually, it's really nice to have the different generations because we then speak to all different types of women. But yeah, it was beating around the kitchen table with my mum. It was a hobby. It was a passion project. And I'd always loved gemstones. We'd always gone down Portobello Road and different markets collecting things.

4:16We started out actually with vintage centerpieces that then we made into gemstone belts. It was so cool. But they were all one-offs, so you couldn't really scale it. But I would go and take my rolls around to shops and literally sell them. But then we started doing... Did your mother have any background in jewellery or vaginal? No, she's just so creative. I mean, she's the most creative person I know. She can set her hand to anything. So she does trompe-l 'oeil, which is like 18th century panelling. And she can do any type of painting. She does sculpture now. She would make her own clothes. She would make the curtains.

4:46Like the whole house was painted and done by her. I have. She is pretty fabulous. She saved my father a lot of money. She likes to remind him. And she's still pretty fabulous. Even now, she's the most stylish woman I know. Really? She's very chic. Love that. Can you come and do a mother-daughter chic? I would love to. I mean, she's quite shy. But I think I could persuade her. She is just the most chic. She still has much cooler clothes than me. I love that. And that generation, sorry, we're getting off topic. Yeah, we're getting off the tangent. It's so special to find women in their 70s or 80s or whatever they are who have that kind of old school, natural glamour.

5:20Yeah, amazing. And they dress for themselves. They never leave the house not looking completely put together. Oh, my mother. Yeah, I love my mother has her bath every night and get to eat and just suffer. Oh, I love that. I know, I've said that many times. It always amuses people. Kitchen table, you, your mother, your sister dipping in and out. Yeah, so it started out like a cottage industry. And then I started going to jewellery students, and they were people I would pay to help bead up the pieces. Then I went and found factories as we needed to scale. And I went to Jaipur, Bangkok, Hong Kong, all on my own, going to find all the different factories.

5:51We must have tested out about 20 before we settled on two. And that is really hard, isn't it? Yeah. I think that is something not to be underestimated, that finding the right factory suppliers is one of the hardest things to get right. But also it was different in those days. Like we didn't have Google Maps, right? We didn't, I don't think, did we have smartphones then? Like back in like, I mean, I was even finding them sort of back in 2005 when it was, you know, still a hobby, 2006 before we really started MISIMA. Because at that point we were still just, you know, trying things out. I had my corporate day job at Richemont.

6:22Oh, did you? Yeah, I worked at Richemont. What was your role there? I didn't really understand. It was corporate. You were a bit distracted. Yeah, it was corporate media strategy. But basically I didn't really understand what we actually did or what we actually, added to the other brands it was just very corporate and nothing actually I don't know it didn't move I always wanted to be in an industry where things move fast I like to you know yeah I like to get shit done yeah it's still one of my mottos I know I know I think we're the same I was too impatient I was at Coty and was told that there were there were gonna be no promotions because they just acquired a business I was like right I'm done this is not moving quickly enough yeah gotta take it to my own hands and yeah I think we're probably quite similar like that were you then starting to think that this okay I'm gonna create a serious business here no I think I still had no idea where it would go I think it still was very organic we were selling and we were sort of breaking even um but it was such a slog and it was still in the old days when it was wholesale and it was mainly trade shows and it was just one trade show after another it was a lot of just traveling so you were wholesaling your product yeah we were starting to basically go to trade shows and wholesale and I would do every single trade show myself every single like press desk visit myself every single um I don't know tax return or it was even before we sort of had an online shop i think the first online shop we launched the first website was probably 2010 probably 2011 the transactional one still remember it cost like two and a half grand when you think now what they cost um they were all bespoke then yes i know god four lines of code just for a line break or something i mean it was so painful i know do you remember entering every single thing yourself i do um i do i remember like scanning code looking for where there would be a gap or not a closed bracket or something because then when you looked at it from the front end there was an error yeah you just wanted to learn it yourself so you didn't need to rely on a third party agency to fix it for you again it's just like we've got to do it ourselves you know it's scrappy and i think those are the the most important routes to kind of also keep hold of and lucy came along in 2000 and we met in 2014 yeah how did you meet we just met through a mutual friend didn't we and kind of connected and she was like you guys should go for a coffee and this is like kind of story of my life I think where we've met and I think you probably went into it thinking maybe this will be like one necklace and one bracelet and then well no we weren't even thinking of collaboration at the point I was just thinking you know you might wear us yeah yeah then we got chatting and you were like maybe we should do something together and and then I think and then I was like yeah I've got this idea for 20 a 20 piece collection and it just kind of we just hit it off straight away and there was just this natural synergy and you know I remember you describing yourself as a jewelry maven like you were like a jewelry kind of magpie magpie sorry yeah yeah and then we started sketching on a napkin in the cafe can we just go back to 2014 you met yes what stage was your career because you left sherlock's you went to in style yeah you had fashion me now yeah and I mean you were one of you know if you were one of the OG you know obviously Monica was around in those days I think there's just us two or maybe one other you know you gave them a run for their money and by the way we love that brand and have a great relationship with them as we do for you I remember Cassandra the founder of Popcorn saying you know her heart sank when Tyrell's launched Popcorn at the same time as her and then she realized actually that that was a category and that you needed a category launched before them so as in there were only three of us in that era and the category didn't really exist it actually It took years and years and years to get people to understand what kind of demi-fine was, what that goal for May was, what that kind of price point quality, et cetera, was.

9:59So there was about seven years in the wilderness just kind of barely making it, you know, work. But you were, you and they and maybe one other was sort of, you know, you had the market for this demi-fine jewellery that was fashion-led, but not too edgy and commercial and da-da-da-da. anyway and she was creating it all as well as as you went you know it was all new you were one of the first doing what you do and you were doing it in a I was describing a shoot we just done for de Savary and I was like this is hot cool contemporary but commercial and that commercial piece I think is so important and it's something that's always been really important at Sheard Arts is being commercial I think you always were as well with your I had no idea what I was doing I feel like my whole job my whole career has been a bit of a happy accident because when I left university when I left July's when I left in style doing this was like before Instagram so no one was really doing it as a full-time job it was all just sort of a bit like oh is this going to be a thing is that going to be a thing so it's just sort of been figuring it out as I go but yeah and we did a podcast not that long ago oh yeah it was only for our EIR readers yes not everyone got to see it but can you give us a sort of potted history of in style fashion we now you left in style so I went to it yeah after in style I went into trend forecasting a company called stylus I was there for about three years but I was very much doing my blog on the side sort of weekends evenings and it was very it was kind of at that era where blogs were sort of like sort of tumblr-esque you know you would be like oh I really like this collection this is why and then at the same time I started going to fashion week was my job and I think street style was just kind of starting as a thing so I mean it was definitely not the beast that it is now and so I kind of started thinking oh okay well I'll put that those photos of what I wore at fashion week up on my blog and then honestly there was no sort of great theory behind it I think I was just constantly thinking is this something that I would like or I would do you know what I mean like almost like if I'm comfortable with it if I like it then cool and it just sort of happened like that I mean what you designed what sheer lux is what you put out there is all about going with your gut and what you would want and that's absolutely and I think and making mistakes along the way there were definitely times that I did things that I look back on now and I'm like that's so not me why did I do that or getting sucked into it's a journey Lucy it's a journey yeah you just gotta figure it out no but you gotta I feel like you gotta do those things to then be able to listen to your gut for the next time but i also think that yeah exactly organic way that like you know your career evolved um you know miss and evolved you know even sheer luck's like there there then became a plan then there became a bigger team etc but it started in the weeds scrappy and making all those mistakes learning from them but it's that perseverance that just complete determination to not give up i mean i remember at one time thinking oh my god am i ever going to make this work is this ever going to become something but i think in order to appreciate the good times you have to have gone through those hard times and it's all about that roller coaster and there's so many ups and downs even now it's so hard with like the gold price tariffs etc but you know how to get through them because you've been through so many of those you know difficult times challenges yep yeah i remember thinking when will i have just like a straight run without any shit to deal with you know be it a lockdown or a financial crash and i was like i've realized that this is just life and it will continue you met in 2014 yeah what stage was missma at we were probably stopped in lots of department stores just going to b2c weren't you yeah we would we just set up our online shop maybe a year and a half before i mean i remember at the point where it was like two orders a day three orders a day we probably had 10 people in the team at that point we did have quite a big wholesale business so it was when we'd made that shift from wholesale to d2c it's it's very difficult when you wholesale jewelry it doesn't get shown the way you want it to be seen so we wanted to go direct to our customers how we find them and that's when social media was still so early days you know with Instagram but we wanted to sell a look and a lifestyle not a product and I think most brands or jewelry brands in those days were still very much selling it as a product and it just felt so jewelry 101 it felt so old-fashioned and so when I looked at someone like Lucy and her aesthetic it was exactly how we wanted the jewelry to be worn you know in that really effortless um every day um you know dress it up dress it down but jewelry that becomes part of your every day that you never take off and so it became about showcasing it on real people and how they would style it so yeah i think it was a big shift from wholesale to d to c at that point you were your first accounts also so we had like harvey nichols we had selfridges we had harrods we had fortnum mason i mean i'm trying to think who else we had some international ones as well probably like Lane Crawford, Hong Kong.

14:51We did have a lot. I also on the side was making money by doing, designing for big kind of departments. Oh yeah, I do remember. White label. I even used to do a bit of like Shop NBC and QVC, not in the UK, but I had to make ends meet. I had to make money. While we were in that stage of like, I call the seven years in the wilderness, you've got to do what you've got to do. You've got to like help, you know, bringing the money that's going to pay for the business. You were on QVC then? Not UK. I think we did QVC Germany. I did Shop NBC US, that was in Minneapolis. I did a lot of that. I'm not surprised, Marisa.

15:23I'm sure. I imagine it was a small of the time. I'm a talker. So 2014, Tash comes along and says, right, have coffee with Marisa. Off you go, you have coffee. No massive agenda other than you admire her style. You know the brand, I presume. I suppose I wanted her to wear it if she loved it and wore it on her every day. As I say, we weren't in a position to pay anyone at that stage. It was still that kind of relationship building. so you know you're hoping that they're going to love you know the product but then we hit it off we were like oh my god we should do something together and no one had done that before no one had actually fused you know influences was such a new um category i suppose you know just like our category was within jewelry and it was just this natural i don't know exciting idea yeah so how did the conversation go probably like we can do five pieces you saying lady what are you thinking for this design collaboration and I was like well here's my idea for 14 pieces and it's continued that way for 10 years by the way it's always me going we're gonna do it's always me being more more more but now I blame it on merch I just go oh merch say we can only have x number of skews it's good it's kind of I'm never short of ideas I just find I find it quite hard to limit myself sometimes but even now you're never short of ideas what's been great with us in terms of doing the collaboration why it's lasted as long as it has it's probably because we've never done the kind of we've never said okay well we have to do this amount many collections or we have to do one a year two a year like I'm in awe of people who have that level of creativity spilling over I think for me especially with jewellery for me it's like I'm kind of like I always love seeing new pieces but actually like when I think of something do you know what I'm really craving wearing something a bit more like this or I'm really feeling like this is going to be the thing that I want to wear.

17:09She gives me a call. I say to Marisa, like, I'm kind of thinking about maybe, what do you think, how do you feel about this? Do I really want to do? And it kind of goes like that. So I think, yeah, I don't know. That's how I work. I feel like lots of people who are much more creative than me are able to come up with, you know, six collections a year. But I think... There's always pieces that are missing that you really want. Yeah, I've always come at it from a pretty personal place of being like, oh, I just, I really want this, selfishly. I think other people hopefully would like it as well. Well I think this is a really good point to ask you what you're wearing because we always get asked.

17:44We're going to get it in the comments so let's do it. Marisa you look amazing by the way. I've known you for a long time now. I've never seen you look so hot as you do. Motherhood suits you clearly. I have just dyed my hair, had my nails done and had my lashes done. Shoes are Totem, the most comfortable shoes. I've had them for like I don't know a year and a half. trousers are like these really lovely corduroy by nilly lotan i love her trousers t-shirts just like a cos t-shirt which i actually got makeup on earlier they're so good those t-shirts jacket is oh a vintage find um i suppose it's from the 80s the in found and vision which is top of portobello road just by like the goldborn road crossroad which is where i kind of basically live near there and hang out near there and it's my fave vintage place i i'm feeling like there needs to be a bit of Sherlock's social content with Marisa around Portobello showing us her.

18:37Yeah, yeah. I have my crystal dealer. I can skip that bit. John? Yeah, I can skip that bit. I feel like that's not really your vibe. What, the gemstones? The crystals? Yeah. Oh, you're not a crystal person? No, no. I've got one that someone gave me. I'm going to give you one. You went to horoscope. And I'm going to... You went to horoscope. No, I'm not a horoscope person, but I've been collecting gemstones since I was five years old. Lovely. What do you do with them? lovely i used to have glass shelves all around my my room when i was little my dad just kept on putting up more and more shelves as the kind of crystal collection grew and one time i was away at uni and i remember my uncle came and stayed and he's a buddhist right so he kind of is also very in tune with these things and the next day he went down and my mom was like how did you sleep and he was like terrible terrible just like was the bed too hard was it too hot you know what was wrong he's like far too much energy in that room because people used to always say where do you get energy from and the joke at school was the crystals.

19:28I mean, I appreciate a good crystal as much as the next person. What do you mean you appreciate a good crystal? If they look nice, if they, you know, if someone's like, here's a bracelet, it's going to give you energy, I'm like, I'll wear it. I'm more of a if I can't sleep, I'm going to take a melatonin. But I'm not even a pair of intention. Like, I think it can be psychosomatic. I'm with you on that, yeah. Let's get back to the jewellery. That was great. Alright, so, new mixed metal Tiva necklace that is basically just an everyday piece mixed with my tennis necklace. I never take off and I just love layering the things.

20:01Is that your own? Yes. Well, no, it's a Missima one, but it is, yeah. I like mixing the metals, so, and it just feels very easy to wear. Little knot earrings. Love those. They've got the pavé on them. Am I wearing the gold ones with the pavé? And then, yeah, the rest is just my normal bracelet stack. I've got tennis bracelets. I've got an organic bag. Are they all Missima? Everything is Missima bar. Let me think. that piece which is just a vintage one I bought for myself got a welding that I did with my mum which I really enjoyed doing with her you do welding with all the little like cute charms so I got and I have a little welding with a little diamond yeah so I've got the little diamond one but then we got the little evil eye we've got like the you know burst and we have the little like mushroom we got little chilies kind of fun ones gorgeous loving loving the combination Lucy, your turn.

20:46I'm wearing an and-daughter little knit T-shirt. Massimo Dutti trousers. These are really cool. Jill Sander shoes. Can you lift them up? Yeah, although just please don't look too closely at my toenails. No, they won't see those. And my cuts on my heels. Oh, and I love the ankle. I've already did. Of course you have. Dreadful. I haven't done the posts on my kind of pedicure yet. Yeah, I haven't either. My jewellery. So this is part of the new collection? Yeah, this is the new pieces, yeah. And what is the new collection called? It's called Full Circle. It definitely means a lot, but it was also from a very simplistic thought process from the fact that we, because we were doing the entwine pieces for a long time, entwine hoops, we did the entwine cord, and then we just started exploring with this collection of shrinking the entwine down until we got a knot and kind of going into that eternity full circle.

21:35Anyway, and also like 10 years. I love how you describe it. Yeah, it just kind of worked. Next, this is new. And can we have your earrings, please? Yeah, so this is the first time in this collection that we've done some stones, some topaz. Is this a missing note we're wearing now? Yeah, these are from the new collection. And the little mini - The baguettes. And the one in my - Oh, I love those. And we do them in a really long version as well. And then this is one of the new - We've done fine for the first time. It's funny because now I look back and the first few collections that were quite beachy, quite hippie.

22:04I don't know. And I still love those, but I feel like now, 10 years on, I mean, I've always been, as you know, I've never been a, I don't know, I'm definitely more of a jeans and t-shirts person. I'm always verging on underdressed versus overdressed. That's how I just feel more comfortable. I would way rather be the only person at the party wearing jeans than the only person at the party wearing a dress. And you know, not everyone's like that. No, lose the same. I mean, yeah. That's how I've realised. I do like wearing stones. I like a little bit of sparkle, but it's just like, I'll wear this with more like a t-shirt.

22:35I wouldn't do, whereas then if I'm wearing something a bit more glam, if I ever wear stuff a bit more glam, I'd probably wear more just like a gold hood or a chunky chain or something. Three of those in a row would look amazing. I've got to show you the long one because I think long earrings now are so, you know, much more fun to wear in that movement. Or you can do a long and then a short. You do long and then two shorts. And also down there, there's that bracelet, right? And that bracelet, no, this... The tennis one. The baguette with the solitaire. So it's basically all baguette and then solitaires.

23:05And we do it as a tennis bracelet, but then we also do it as a tennis necklace. Oh, that's really nice. And it is just so beautiful, that kind of more geometric. I have a thing about the number eight. And so we have a lot of octagons. We had an octagon coin. Yeah, this is my woo-woo moment. I just like the number eight. It's like a lucky number. And I like an octagon. And so we did the octagon coin, and they are slightly octagon-shaped. They are slightly octagon-shaped. I see that. Do you always agree? No. Do you disagree? No. we definitely disagree but I think we we appreciate I we appreciate that each other has different strengths yes so like there are things that I think it's like any 10-year relationship isn't it like there's always going to be the highs and the lows I think our relationship oh you know has outlived our collaborations outlive some of our relationships yeah so and but I think it is kind of like a marriage like when you do a collaboration when it's a real collaboration and it's authentic and it's based on a relationship and a friendship.

24:06There are highs and lows, but we respect each other and each other's opinions and, as you said, each other's strengths. I know that Lucy knows exactly what is actually, like, you know, going to be, I don't know, cool or different or wearable. And then she'll kind of, like, you know, maybe listen to me and the team on whether we can make it work price point-wise, whether we can make it work in terms of, like, I don't know, the gold weight or whether we can find, I don't know, those stones. There are good products and there are good businesses. And then it was the same thing. And, you know, I guess that's how it works, isn't it?

24:41And there are some things that I probably have to kind of push on a bit in terms of product. Like, I'm still trying to get a toe ring over the line. I'm on your team. Yeah, 20 % of the pieces will be the tone setting. Georgie, we'll get you there. Don't you? Just you wait. No, you will not. No, I will. I will. But if anyone could, it would be you. I need to set you the challenge, Lucy. Okay, deal. Just want to get on my team now. Lucy is always right. She just knows what is coming. Can I get that in writing? The thing is, it's merch. Well, yeah, you can get it and record it. It's on the internet now.

25:16You've got it forever. Here you are, 10 years, and this is stunning. Can I just say that little tea bar with the little baguettes is gorgeous. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's a goodie. Gorgeous, too. Can we talk about the first collection? because you sort of broke the internet when you launched that collection. Yeah, did we? Yes. Okay. I remember it so well. It was beautifully shot. It was you and you were, you know, the girl. Everyone followed. It was Miss Ma that had a different point of view from Monica. Yeah, everyone's got their own brand DNA. Absolutely. And you really had your own and they had their own.

25:57Yeah, yeah. And you've continued. absolutely um to do that but it was a big moment i don't think anyone had thought of coming together no brand had come together it's funny though it's it's so funny talking about it now because i just didn't i don't obviously like i was really excited to do it because i'd never sort of designed something before and i what this has given me as much like over the years not from day one but definitely over the years it's given me more confidence in my own sort of trusting my gut and being able to create things and designing things in other categories. But I don't think at the time I kind of went into it thinking this is it or this is a big thing.

26:33It just sort of was like a sort of like... Yeah, we had no expectation. We had no expectation. But it was, right? So what do you remember about when you launched and how you launched and how quickly it sold and how... You probably remember more about that than me because I just was more just like along for the ride. So for us it was more about the storytelling and the collaboration and the kind of relationship. ship we didn't know if it was going to sell right we thought it was an amazing collection but we didn't know if it was going to sell I think why it was so different was no one had come together like that but it really was so as I say scrappy the launch was in my kitchen actually on my kitchen table I mean with literally sand and shells and bits of wood and we were carrying down a table a wooden table that nearly broke our backs down to the um like little kind of like patio where we kind of stuffed 30 people in and it was just so, I don't know.

27:23Yeah, I like, it's funny when I look, those pictures of the sort of, the logs cut in half with sea urchins and sand with the jewellery displayed on it. I mean, they slightly kill me. It does, it kills me. But you know, it's all part of the process. We had an easel with a poster, that was it. I mean, when you think it was so before times of like how we do branding now. But it flew out the door, right? Look, this is the point. The designs were amazing. The styling, you know, it was so Lucy. It was, you know, her followers, they want to, you know, get that style. They want to know how to style it.

27:59And yeah, it was just something really different at the time. Now, there are a dime a dozen, obviously. But I still think you can tell when something's really authentic, when there's a real relationship behind the scenes. And, you know, obviously Lucy's so involved in the designing as well. It's not just, oh, sign something off at the end. You know, there are emails, there are WhatsApp groups, there are. there are a lot of meetings a lot of meetings and it takes a year to make a collection like we literally take a year from like first sketch to when we launch how many collections more this one's been almost two yeah but i think yeah that's because we weren't in a rush we kind of like to take our time and do things you know when the time's right how many collections we've done one two three four roman art this is kind of like 1987 lucy and silver mixed metals yeah but some of them I feel like I feel like capsules yeah there's little bit there's little bits in between I'd say there's probably been five five main ones main ones the coins oh the coins yeah which collection was that the Roman collection that went wild right well you came back from Rome it was all inspired by your trip to Rome I did my 30th in Rome and sort of wanted to start thinking about medallions and sort of yeah I don't know and it just sort of god that was good yeah I've still my daughter's nabbed it.

29:13I mean, it's still... Love that. But talk about things... I can't get it back off her. I was like, you can borrow it, but I will have it back. But talk about things standing the test of time. So that is still one of our best sellers. No, I'm not surprised. It's a great... It was a great collection. It's like eight years or something. It was 2017, I remember. And it's still such a great seller. And I mean, there are so many stories I hear. Like one of our customers said that she and all her friends, like I think four or five of her friends all have the Roman Ark. and they all wear it on the same day if one of them has, let's say, an interview or is going to find out about a promotion or, I don't know, going on a date or something.

29:49And it's their kind of, their way of saying, we're all thinking about each other, we're all like in it together. And it's kind of like your armour. Very sweet. Yeah, I thought that was so sweet. I love hearing those kind of stories from customers, why they wear their jewellery, because it's so emotional.

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31:05You definitely spearheaded collaborations with brands or had a huge part to play in brands collaborating with influencers because it then, and I won't sit here and name them all, but, you know, find me a successful influencer and a jewelry brand or a fashion brand or whatever that hasn't collaborated. They often run their course and that doesn't mean they weren't great why are you still able to be doing this successfully 10 years later obviously you get on but is it that it's so lucrative is it that you love each other and the brands and it's what's the sort of magic formula and can we talk about the business side of it as well but also also what is the magic formula because a lot of them run their course I think one of the main things is that we've never really set, we never set a goal for doing it for a certain amount of time.

32:02And we also never set an end date. So it's always just been quite an open kind of relationship. Yeah, it has. It's always just been quite open in that sense. And like, I think that's helped because I think if we'd started and you'd said, cool, sign on the dotted line for five years, I would have been a bit like, oh, I don't know, you know. and if you told me then that you'd still be doing this in 10 years but then actually I also think it's nice to not have anything to like it means that actually when I have felt like oh there's something else I'd quite like to do I really want to try and make this Maurice has always been open to being like well let's talk about it let's discuss it you and I don't I think you've never put me in a box in terms of thinking like will you do this type of thing for us and nothing else you've kind of every collection we've done has been slightly different you know and she you've kind of allowed me to kind of be like well now I'm in this phase of life or now I'm feeling like I want to do a bit of this and yeah I kind of feel like we've gone through those phases of life together as well like maybe slightly at separate times but you know whether it's breakups getting married like they've been we've you know we've been through so much in the last 10 years and you know just personal growth but I do think it's all been about when it's right time when it feels right um when you felt that you know you've got something to you know say creatively it has to be a real relationship it has to be authentic and you know whether that is since then you know years later we did one with harris reed you know he's a great friend of mine i love him to death and it's the same thing it's an authentic relationship can we talk about the business side of a collaboration without wanting to to sort of be too invasive can you talk a bit about how that works because i wonder if every brand is the same how you navigate it do you do it on percentage of fees is it up front how do you you just do it as a percentage of commission yeah it's a royalty and so many people have come to me over the years sort of saying how do you do it you know and i think it's probably evolved a bit over over the years and it depends who you're doing it with if you're going to do it with someone who i don't know has 20 million followers and is some big you know a-list star there might be something yeah i think i think up front i think it depends if they have an agent we actually did it do you remember but just before yeah we did it But the thing is, I think it's so different, isn't it?

34:11Because when we started doing it, we just, I mean, it's really great because we started doing it and we did it from the very beginning. It was just done on a percentage. I think there was like a two-page piece of paper. Yeah, it was. But I think now it would be, I'm sure there would be a lot more to sort of think about and you would. But I think that was kind of, in a way, that's probably why it's lasted 10 years because we went into it having no idea what it would become and it was kind of the contract that we went into was kind of open-ended for it to become that. So we do have to update it because suddenly there are new channels, there are new things.

34:43So nowadays it's so much more multidimensional. Like when we're launching this new collection, like now we've got bricks and mortar or, you know, now we need to be thinking TikTok or now we need to be thinking, I don't know, Substack, etc. There are so many more channels. And also there are so many more, even the paid space, the paid digital, you know, collaborative posts, this and that. So there's a lot more, I suppose, elements to put into a contract, but the fundamentals stay the same. You are an international success story. You've built a brand that is still here and relevant and evolving and producing exciting collections.

35:1918 years on, that is not to be undervalued. You know. Yeah, and yes, but equally, jewellery is a hugely competitive market. Yeah, it's very saturated now. But you have a very, very strong brand. that's still very loved and still has that cool edge but commercial yeah yeah that combination which i think is so so key how have you navigated the last 18 years and kept your relevance i mean i'm sure lucy has helped definitely yeah how lucy brings like an effortless you know aspirational but still really you know attainable i think it's building community and i think it's storytelling and I think it's staying relevant with your brand marketing.