Q&A: Lily Schlosser on Eli & Barry

Local blogger Lily Schlosser, who's also the studio and fashion manager at Lauryn Byrdy Photography, just added one more line to her resume: jewelry designer.

The 26-year-old Colorado native is crafting a collection of earrings, necklaces, rings and bracelets under the name Eli & Barry.

First out of the gate are her Greater Than earrings, pictured here, which will be available for purchase (in both pairs and individually) mid-April. Watch her blog for details. Click on the photo to enlarge.

We caught up with Schlosser to learn more about the line, the origins of its name and which celebrity she'd love to see in her designs.

-Taylor Starek, @taylorstarek

How did you come up with the name Eli & Barry?

I'm working with a company-it's actually owned by my grandmother and has been in my family for as long as I can remember. They're based in Colorado, and the company name is Elliot Barry. It's two brothers who started it way back when, and what they produce is traditionally pins for your lapel. It's always been a dream of mine to work on something with them related to jewelry. I wanted to stay true to my family's heritage and speak to this company that's been in my family a really long time, and I made it a bit modern by shortening Elliot's name to Eli and then adding the "&" to make it Eli & Barry.

What will Eli & Barry's aesthetic be like?

It's kind of interesting because I've gone through a lot of a style evolution in my twenties and being a wardrobe stylist and a blogger, I've seen my style change, but this line really is going to reflect where I'm at at this point in my life, which is very sort of minimal, but I still love these strong design elements and statement pieces. Everything you see in this collection is going to be something you can wear every day, something that is going to catch someone's eye because it might be a little bit different. But you can still mix it and match it with other pieces in your wardrobe and really make it your own. I really wanted to create things that were timeless and not too trendy, visually pleasing and interesting.

Where are looking for inspiration?

I've sort of been surprised with my first earring design-I'm just interested in shapes right now and shapes you could see anywhere. I was online looking at a blog or Pinterest, and I just saw some of these greater-than and less-than symbols like in math, and I thought those would be such a unique, minimal, interesting earring design. I thought that would be a really great first design for me, and it made me smile because I'm just really terrible at math. I found this humor because math is something that's just never worked out for me. How can I make it into something that kind of works out for me? I'm sort of making it into more of a visual expression rather than what it actually means.

Price points?

I'm selling them as a pair and as individuals, so if you like to have two different earrings as I do a lot, you can mix and match and just buy one. So a pair would retail for $60, and a single earring would retail for $30. That is directly linked to the material, which is a gold-filled material, and then the posts are surgical steel that are gold plated, which is great because I have extremely sensitive ears, and I've had reactions to earrings that were not the best material before. I've been wearing my Greater Than earrings for months now with no reaction, so that's been great.

Name one celebrity you'd like to see wearing your designs.

I think of some of my favorite style icons, who if I saw wearing one of my designs I would probably just explode. Kate Bosworth, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen or even their sister, Elizabeth Olsen. Their style is just so unique but still somehow classic and uniquely their own.

Photos courtesyLauryn Byrdy Photography. Flowers for shoot provided byRose Bredl.