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Masha Shapiro created Beloved NYC as a collection to commemorate or celebrate family, friends and all who are beloved in our lives. We love the sweet, sentimental and soulful messages on her chic bracelets and ring necklaces, which allows the wearer to hold their nearest and dearest close. In anticipation of her launch at JA New York Summer’s New Designer Gallery, we caught up with Masha to get some insight into her design process, and to get some intel on her inner villain.

JA New York: How would you describe your brand to someone who is not familiar with it? Give us your “elevator pitch!” 

Masha Shapiro: A collection of jewelry that harks back to old world sentimentality but has been designed with the modern woman in mind. It celebrates and commemorates those we want to keep close everyday and those we lost and love.

JA New York: Do you have a particular wearer in mind when you’re designing?

MS: Anyone who prefers symbolic, meaningful jewelry to big gemstones or bold gold. I do design in 18K gold and black enamel so that women can wear the pieces everyday and with most anything they own in their wardrobes. Most importantly, these pieces are for always remembering our loved ones.

JA New York: What is your biggest source of design inspiration?

MS: Victorian era sentimental and memorial jewelry. Another inspiration was not being able to find a cool locket bracelet as opposed to a locket one wears around the neck to hold photos or small mementos.”

JA New York: What’s one thing that always makes you smile?

MS: My four year old and some of the wild things he says and comes up with. I am pregnant and know I am having a girl and he talks to her through my stomach–and tells her that he is going to give her a ‘time out’ if she doesn’t listen to me.

JA New York: If you could be a TV/Movie villain, who would you be and why?

MS: Poison Ivy–the Uma Thurman version–because she had to have absolutely the most beautiful costume I’ve ever seen any villain wear.

JA New York: Do you have a “special skill” that people don’t know about?

MS: Decorating, whether it be a friends home, a nursery for a new born infant,  or every aspect and detail of a birthday party.

JA New York: If you could spend one day in somebody else’s shoes, whom would it be and why?

MS: Meryl Streep, because she is able to put herself in someone else’s shoes much of the time. Plus I saw her in a grocery store once and spoke to her and she is one of the most down-to-earth people I’ve met as well as the most talented actress living today.

The JA New York Summer Show is taking place July 23-25th at the Jacob K. Javits Center. Click here to register to attend!