Every Efemera piece is born in New York City. Not designed here and manufactured elsewhere — made here. Carved, cast, finished, and set by hand in a city that never stops making things.
Why NYC
New York has been the center of American jewelry-making for over a century. The Diamond District on 47th Street alone contains roughly 2,600 independent jewelry businesses in a single block — dealers, cutters, setters, casters, polishers, and designers stacked vertically in pre-war buildings.
But the city's jewelry ecosystem extends far beyond midtown. Independent studios in Brooklyn, workshops in the Lower East Side, shared bench spaces in the Navy Yard — this is where the next generation of jewelry is being made. The supply chain is local and personal: a stone dealer you know by name, a caster you've worked with for years, a polisher across the street.
The Process
Each piece starts as an idea, then becomes a wax model — carved by hand with dental-style tools, heated spatulas, and files. This is where the organic quality of our designs is born. The pressure of the designer's hand, their instinct for form.
The wax is encased in investment plaster, heated to burn out the wax (creating a negative mold), then molten 14k gold at 1,030°C is forced into the cavity. The plaster is broken away, revealing a raw casting.
Then the real work begins: hours of hand-finishing. Filing, sanding through progressively finer grits, polishing with compounds. Setting each stone, pushing bezels by feel. For enamel pieces, hand-painting each color, curing, leveling, polishing.
Made to Order
We don't keep inventory. When you place an order, your piece enters production — materials are sourced, wax is carved, metal is cast, stones are set. This takes 4-8 weeks. During peak seasons, longer.
This means when you receive your piece, it wasn't sitting on a shelf. It was made for you, for this moment. The artisan who finished it was thinking about the person who would wear it.
That's what handmade in New York means to us.
