Designer makes a splash with one-of-a-kind jewelry

Darlene Mandel has been collecting, designing and creating one-of-a-kind jewelry, fashion accessories such as hats and headpieces, up-cycled clothing, beach totes and other items since 1979. She may be best known for her so-called Esther Williams jewelry.

Williams, a champion swimmer, was a unique Hollywood actress for whom a subgenre of film — the aqua musical — was created in the 1940s and ’50s. Many of her films involved her water-skiing, swimming or otherwise around water.

Jewelry and other special accessories were created for her to use in the water, and those are among the inspirations behind Mandel’s creations.

"Five years ago I was lucky enough to purchase an estate," she said. "A couple jewelers had a jewelry store for 40 years, and their house was full of vintage parts and pieces that had never been made up," Mandel said. Her haul included 1950s-era plastic flowers "that Esther Williams made famous," she said.

"Every woman in America wanted a pair of these plastic flower earrings," she said. Now Esther Williams-style jewelry is a "genre all its own, like steampunk is," she said.

"I hand-make every necklace and pair of earrings, and they’re very popular among the kids, who have never even heard of Esther Williams," she chuckled. "I can make it like they didn’t make it in the old days, (meaning) bigger and bolder." The plastic and rhinestone components make her jewelry light to wear, she said.

She doesn’t limit herself to one style, though.

"I’m actually a big trend-follower," she said. "In my jewelry line, for example, I try and stay with what’s trending, what’s in style, and interpret that, you know, with my own signature." Feather earrings have been popular three times in her time as an artisan, she observed.

Her jewelry prices range from $10 to $75, or higher for some pieces offered for sale in her online Etsy shop.

Some of the items were not handmade by Mandel, but are among vintage items she has collected over the years, including kimonos and unusual jewelry.

The selections include a colorful and sparkly adjustable Trifari choker. "Trifari is a brand name of jewelry," she said. "It’s an old name and they still make jewelry today." The older stuff, however, is "extremely collectible, like Coco Chanel." Trifari was known for making gold-tone jewelry with pearls, but for a short time in the 1950s, they made rhinestone jewelry including the piece she collected and is offering for sale at $189.

For her handmade jewelry and upscaled, repurposed merchandise, she gets inspiration from everywhere, from tourist-oriented retailers in Wai­kiki to window displays at Prada, she said.

Mandel also repurposes vintage items, such as old polo shirts, which she converts into beach totes that she sells for $8. She will add a ruffle and a pocket to a vintage skirt, and she finds and sells vintage kimonos but she would only sell the latter at vintage- and collectible-type shows, not craft fairs where items must be handmade.

As a board member of the Handcrafters and Artisans Alliance, Mandel feels strongly about maintaining the integrity of local handcrafters’ events and keeping the shows of locally made goods sustainable, she said.

Mandel moved to Hawaii in 1982 and settled in Kona but has moved back and forth between Hawaii island and Oahu over the years. During some years on the Big Island, she opened a 2,400-square-foot store called Fabulous, in Kona.

"It was right below Costco. It was a giant warehouse, and it was full of vintage arts and crafts and antiques, and we had a section of new designer clothing," Mandel said. "We had some really good stuff and a bead shop," she said. She closed it in 2009, moved back to Oahu and now lives on a farm in Wai­ma­nalo.

For the past five years, "I’ve gotten slowly back to doing what I did in the ’80s, traveling and doing craft fairs," but also gardening and raising lili­koi and bananas, she said. She says she’s retired, but "I’m still doing the prime shows and still creating in my studio."

"Buy Local" runs on Aloha Fridays. Reach Erika Engle at 529-4303, erika@staradvertiser.com or on Twitter as @erikaengle.