New Beginnings with The M Jewelers

January 11, 2022

Allow The M Jewelers to reintroduce themselves. The cult-followed jewelry brand was propelled to prominence by means of social media, but founder and jeweler Mark Shami wanted the true essence of the brand to shine through in a tangible and genuine sense, and with the opening of their new flagship store in NoLita — they accomplished just that.

One step into the new location tells you that this is no average shopping experience. The M Jewelers isn’t just about the products you leave with, but about the story behind the jewelry and the community it creates. In order to create a more intimate experience, the store is loaded with personal touches, such as a scent Shami and his team created exclusively for the location and a curated playlist so that you can really get to know the people behind the irresistible baubles.

Interview by Kayla Curtis-Evans
Photos Courtesy of The M Jewelers

office had the opportunity to visit the elegant new space and speak to Mark Shami ahead of the store opening this past weekend. Read on to really get to know The M Jewelers.

How did your story with The M Jewelers begin?

I started the company around eight years ago. I have a background of jewelers in my family; my dad was in the jewelry industry. He had a little mom-and-pop shop in the Diamond District and then my two uncles were both in the industry as well. I was always working with all of them and it was kind of a summer job at the time, or, you know, whenever I wasn't in school. So I learned all different aspects of the jewelry industry from them. And then later down the line, after working in the Diamond District for so long and working in their offices, I started to build a little bit of the website and take photos of things that were in my dad's shop. Growing up, I was making a lot of nameplates with my father and he taught me how to make name rings and all that — from start to finish. That was the side of the business that I really enjoyed, so I started developing what would be The M Jewelers in my head, early on. And at that time, the Instagram-era was starting to brew. We started making nameplates and sending them to different people. And there wasn't any paid promo at the time either. So all these people were posting things and it was starting to brew. We kind of built a community online first, and it started funneling in customers and customers. And then about two years later I had my partner join and we started really going after the marketing angle of the business and started gifting a lot. We were making about one-hundred to 150 nameplates a day and sending them out to everybody we could. And it was kind of crazy at the time because we didn't really have any money and we were just going and going. Since then, it's just been a big snowball effect of us taking what we built in the Diamond District and opening up the variety and selection of our products and getting better as a company. But I mean we're eight years in now and we've definitely learned a lot, and tomorrow we open our first actual store. We've done so many pop-ups all over the country and collaborations, like Nike, Kith, Adidas, Converse — a bunch of beauty brands and things like that. In the past year, we've really honed it in and thought, 'Okay, what really represents the brand? What makes sense?'

In what ways is this new storefront an ode to your first store that opened in the Diamond District?

The whole ethos of the brand is always going to be the Diamond District store; it's embedded in me and the brand for sure. And we still make all our personalized pieces there. But the cool thing is our staple items that are still our number one best sellers were our number one best sellers from the first day. So our product assortment is still the same product that we've been doing for eight years now — but with the new store, it's kind of a new rendition of those old products over time. The Diamond District and Mulberry Street to me are very, very similar in their own way though. The Diamond District is like its own country — its own world. When you go over there, it's super different; you feel like you're not even in New York. And then Mulberry is such a close-knit community and there's so much history here. So we want to take a little bit of both and kind of tuck into the street and not be super flashy or anything like that. We want it to feel like, 'Oh, the store's been here for 50 years already.'

I think the cool thing about the simplicity of the store is that it also lets the things that you guys do shine through. On a more personal note, looking back to that store in the Diamond District and then seeing what you have now, how does it feel to be experiencing this new growth for the brand?

Oh, it's amazing. I mean, when we opened that store, I felt like a totally different person. I was a lot younger. I feel like I'm a hundred years old now. That store was only 150 square feet — super tiny. But we were actually recently all looking back at all the photos and things we had from there. We used to pack all our initial orders there and now we have a team of 20 plus people. It's cool to see us grow into a space that's one thousand plus square feet and to let people come in and experience the brand for real here, the music we like to listen to, and to see the product. We created our own scent with a New York-based brand for the store too. So we've done all these things to really capture what the brand is all about, where in the Diamond District, it was just a really little booth and you came in and there could probably be a hundred different things happening at once. But here, it's going to be such a comforting, unique, clean experience. But we'll still have those nitty-gritty Diamond District products that we've always been showcasing.

Why did you decide to collaborate with interior designer Samantha Cullari for the new store?

The cool thing is, everyone who's worked on the store are really close friends of ours. We did it all just with our group. So my partner, Anthony, built the entire store — literally. And that's why it took us so long, but we built everything. It's all custom. It's really, really wild how long it took us because everything is in the details. And then Sam has been an old friend for about 10 years at this point. I always really liked her style. She's design-trained and she has really great taste and we always saw eye-to-eye on everything as far as design. She even built her own house. She said to me, 'Hey, if you're ever designing a store, let me know.' So right when we signed the lease here, I thought, 'Oh, let me go talk to her.' And we started talking and she had the right vision for it. So it really already feels like a community, like even tonight, we have a bunch of people that are dropping off stuff and it's really cool because it's everyone from around the area. It's cool to see everybody come in already and show their support. I feel like it's going to be a really special moment — this whole week.

I love how you added these personal touches to the new store. Can you tell me more about that scent you created?

Yeah, it's with a brand called Sidia. We developed this scent called 'Mulberry' in candles and essential oils for the past couple of months and it's really nice. It's kind of woody; it's calm.

Aside from some of the personal elements you guys added in, what are you most excited for others to see when they enter into this new space?

We have a bunch of surprises. We even built a whole custom flower cart that's going outside tonight and it'll be out for tomorrow. The bouquets are all ribbon-tied with our logo. So we're gonna create a cool experience with that. And even that company is a florist from Jersey City that we grew up with too. They're a little mom-and-pop shop and we're bringing them in to do all the flowers and arrangements and things for people. But what we're really excited about for tomorrow is that we've merchandised so well. We spent so much time on this place so we're really excited for people to understand the brand for the first time, you know? It really feels like it's the first day we're starting because everyone's always looked at us as, 'Oh, this is a really big online company. Is it real? Is it not real? What is it?' So I think tomorrow will solidify that.

Totally. I've known The M Jewelers for a long time but, I agree, a lot of it was on that basis of social media. I think putting a visual aspect to this name that everyone knows has to be something super, super rewarding for you guys.

One-hundred percent.

What about this particular location made you jump at putting the store there?

Our office is a couple of blocks away and I live a few blocks away too. We spend a lot of time in this neighborhood. The big thing here is that it feels like home for us and everyone around us — all the neighboring brands, stores, restaurants, and even wine shops — we know everybody. It just feels kind of perfect. And it was a blank canvas when we came in here, so it really feels like ours now. The moment we walked into this spot, we were like, 'Okay, this is it.’

The new store acts as an immersive shopping experience that travels beyond just shopping — it will also be a space for the community to come together and celebrate. Are there any events you are hoping to host there in the new year?

We have a lot stacked up for the store. One thing we're doing — we have a collaboration coming out with an artist named Mr. K; he's a tattoo artist at Bang Bang. He designed a whole collection by hand and he's going to be doing tattoos in the shop, in a few weeks when we release the collection. We've collaborated with artist and model Alexander Roth twice at this time. We're having him do a night, along with a wine company, where they come and do pairings of things. We're going to be activating very, very frequently. We are also going to do a ‘friends and family night,’ where everyone from the neighborhood, everyone even outside of the city that we're friends with, will come in. We're playing it safe with COVID right now. But in the future, we're going to have a lot of stuff happening here. I would say every few weeks on a monthly basis and especially in the summer. I run all the time and every time I would run past this area, I would think how much fun it is in the summer when there are people hanging out outside. We want to make everybody feel like they're a part of it. Everyone's welcome.

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After 30 years and over 100 cult fragrances, COMME DES GARÇONS PARFUMS 1994–2025 BY SIMONETT & BAER launches this month

December 17, 2024

“I have to add that the topic is, of course, an irrational one, because it's not art and it's not fashion. It has to do with scent, which is something in the air,” explains Dino Simonett, renowned art-book maker and designer/publisher of the new COMME des GARÇONS x SIMONETT & BAER book, which details 30 years of CDG perfumes.

“The moment you smell something is irrational,” he continues. “This book transports you and brings you to the idea behind the perfumes. People have gotten thousands of art catalogues from me, but this fucking perfume thing really drives people a little bit crazy, you know? Because everybody has this bottle; and that bottle smells like this on them; and this bottle I need; and all the memories and everything. I like it a lot that we made this.”

As fans and family of the world’s coolest brand prepared to gather at Dover Street Parfums Market in Paris to celebrate the launch of the book, our Editor-At-Large Paige Silveria shared some coffee and cigarettes with Simonett to discuss his wild trajectory, making books with Joseph Beuys and Tilda Swinton early on, and the importance of nonconformal thinking.

By Paige Silveria

This fucking perfume thing really drives people a little bit crazy.

Paige Silveria: Tell me about yourself. You make books.

Dino Simonett: My books are my art. Each book might be a painting or sculpture. And you should not do the same sculpture all the time. When you hike somewhere, you never should go the same way back home — this is something my mother taught me when I was young. In the same way, it's boring to make the same stuff all the time. So I try to find a way to invent my own language.

PS: This book you’ve made is really beautiful.

DS: It’s hyperrealistic larger-than-life images of boxes and flacons in an endless row presented on paper the thickness of a children’s book.

PS: I loved how it said in the press release that you woke up one Sunday morning and the idea for the book suddenly came to you.

DS: The backstory is that Remo Hallauer [COO of COMME des GARÇONS International] is a true book lover. We met at the Offprint book fair in Paris. And one day, shortly after peak COVID, this email came from him asking if I’d think about a possible collaboration with one of the young stars here — and no hard feelings, but it didn’t work out. So then, as it is in life, which is the essential thing, you have to have an idea. And most of the time, they’re not good enough. You have to have another and another and then you go, Ah ha! Perfume.

PS: And you’d already been pretty familiar with their fragrances?

DS: I’ve known this stuff since the beginning. I wore the first perfume they created. It was part of my life all the time, and I thought, It's so funny. There’s a connection with how I make the books: like two, three books a year, all collaborations and each is different. Just like their perfumes. So I immediately texted Remo.

PS: And what perfect timing, with the 30-year anniversary.

DS: Yes, but this was two years ago or so. I hadn’t had the jubilee in mind. It might not look like much, but there was a lot of work to do.

PS: Many of the advertisements and images weren’t archived, physically or digitally, right? You had to search all over for a good portion of the material?

DS: Well we also had to wait for the official deal to go through in the beginning. Adrian Joffe [President of COMME des GARÇONS International and Dover Street Market International] wanted to do it but he didn’t have the mind space at the time; they were about to open the Dover Street Market here in Paris. So we were on our own for a bit, developing the project from zero. We looked all over the Internet and tried to create the chronology. I had a young guy helping me. He kept reminding me to be patient and to continue to work on growing the book. The door was open, but we had to wait in front of the next room. So we took little steps to prepare ourselves. And stuff slowly worked out.

PS: And thank God for the Internet.

DS: Yes, because as you mentioned, there was no archive. We thought surely they’d have something in the basement. But no, that didn’t exist. At one point they sent us a list of all the perfumes so we had a clear checklist to manage. I had to become an expert.

PS: There are so many, over 100?

DS: Yeah, and at one point the CDG team was activated. It was like a machine and in the spring suddenly a load of stuff was coming. First we had to grow the grapes, then make the wine and then the grappa. And at the end, it's a really strong grappa. And so things came together, and then one day Adrian said, “All is fine, but Rei [Kawakubo] must now also approve it. This is how the system works.” But nobody had told me! So Remo met with Rei to show her the book.

PS: That’s a bit of pressure!

DS: She could have said no and we’d have to throw everything in the garbage, two years of work. There was indeed a little bit of pressure. But it was fine. She liked the book. Then at the end of this summer we met again and they asked if they could have some of the finished copies on 20 November in Tokyo. I said, “I’m sorry, what?” He was thinking that the book was finished, you know? I told him we still needed a lot of material to finish it. Sometimes it's nice though to have this pressure. It's motivating and thrilling when you finally accomplish it all.

PS: Let’s go back. How did your upbringing inform who you are?

DS: It has to do with nonconformal thinking. Most people think the same. And we’re constantly pressured as well, by everything around us to conform. You have to really fight to keep your head and so I had this upbringing with this rather eccentric mother who was absolutely nonconformistic in every way. She was resolute. Why should we follow the path of the masses? It was never my thing. Voilà.

PS: How were you in school?

DS: I was not so good at school. I was only skateboarding at that time. I was on the Swiss National Team. I even was here in Paris at a European championship when I was 15 at the Trocadero. And my mother said, “You are not going to school anymore. You need an apprenticeship. It makes no sense to send you to school any longer.” I was independent and had my first salary at 16.

PS: What were you doing?

DS: I was a carpenter making tables, chairs, all that stuff. All my friends went to high school with like 16-week holidays, while I had only four. And so it was really, really tough shit for a 16 year old. But I learned two important things. The first one was discipline; seven o'clock each day it started and lasted nine hours. And the second thing was precision; you have to do things right. People always said to me that the apprenticeship was good as I’d really use it for the rest of my life. And I always thought that was such bullshit. But actually, it's kind of true. And so anyways, the moment I finished my apprenticeship, the very last day of the last test, I went on the Interrail for one month and never went back to a carpenter shop.

PS: What’d you do after?

DS: I wrote a letter to this very super famous music guy, Claude Nobs who was organizing the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland, telling him I’d like to work there that summer. I mentioned that I’d just finished my apprenticeship for carpentry. He phoned me back immediately after getting the letter. He said, “Oh you’re a carpenter? You can come right now.” He was renovating his apartment in Montreux. So I stayed and worked there alone while he was up at his chalet. I felt like Kevin McCallister from Home Alone in this completely furnished apartment. And then the festival started, and there was this guy from New York doing a large mural painting. It was Keith Haring. I had no idea who he was. We became friends. Then I met George Benson and Herbie Hancock. It started from nothing and then one thing comes, another thing comes, another thing comes. This is how I started, which is maybe not the natural way. But I was following my intuition and taking chances and putting myself out there.

PS: And you're going after what you have a passion for.

DS: I think that’s the best way to live one's life. It was like my own private art school. I met all the guys I was totally hot about. I met Joseph Beuys and told him I wanted to do an art project with him. I got his number and he told me to ask for his assistant. But I took everything for granted, what people said to me. So I had this phone number in Berlin. And I called the guy 20 times until this fucking meeting with Beuys finally happened. And we met and made a small collaboration art magazine called “Quer.” You just have to stick to the stuff.

PS: Wow. You don't still have one of those copies around, do you?

DS: I had one and I brought it to Remo at one of our meetings. Adrian saw it and immediately took it … I hope he gave it back to Remo. Adrian has a pile of my stuff that he wanted to see, so that’s good.

PS: Yeah, of any coffee table in the world for it to be displayed, his is probably in the top 10.

DS: So then I decided my dream was to be a film director. There was a film school in Berlin that I applied to. They only took about 18 people from 600. We waited all week to see this list on the wall for the final call back meeting. And my name wasn’t there. I was like, “Shit!” And then a week later, I received a letter saying I’d been accepted. Later the director told me it was clear enough with my application and the art magazine I’d sent that I’d be accepted. I don’t say this to brag. I say this to tell you that every young person that wants to go somewhere, all they have to do is fight. You have to get out of your house and your small town and your comfort zone and all that shit.

PS: I agree. So you’ve made films?

DS: I made a feature movie and went to the film festival. It was really amazing and everything, but I was not Tarantino, you know? So it’s the last semester and Tilda Swinton is supposed to teach a seminar. I really wanted to attend it. It would be the cherry on top of the cake. Then she postponed it once, then twice. The third time, I’m on the tube and there’s a woman in front of me with a newspaper that says that Tilda’s super mentor, Derek Jarman, had passed away. It’s the very Monday morning that her seminar is set to begin. And I thought, Oh shit. She’s not going to be there. But then she was there after all and it was a fantastic week. There were only five of us students and we all fell in love with her. And she fell in love with us. I’ve known her since.

PS: I can only imagine. How’d you make the transition into books?

DS: You have to find out what you're really good at. I had long discussions with this guru, an old guy who was a very diligent, very bright guy. I was really miserable, feeling directionless. He asked me why I wasn’t continuing with filmmaking. And I couldn't give him an answer. Then he said right into my face, “Probably it’s because you’re not good enough.” The message was one-hundred percent received. It was a relief; I'm not a bad person. This guy told me the truth, and I could accept it. And when you can do this, you can figure out what you actually want to do, what you’re actually good at. I started making books. I made one with another film director. And we visited Tilda at her hotel, bringing one to her as a present. As we’re knocking, I thought to myself, If I did another book focused on people in this business, it’d have to be her. And she opens the door, looks at the book and says, “Oh, I would like to have a book like this on me.”

PS: These situations seem unreal.

DS: I spent five years on her book, which was an enormous success. It included stills from all her films and launched it in different cities. Fantastic shit.

PS: And now you’ve just released this soon-to-be iconic CDG book.

DS: I've learned to be patient; things can take you years. This book with Adrian and Remo took two years and I didn’t even know if it was going to be approved! Follow your dreams as much as you can. It's not so important which dream it is exactly. If I see a step in front of me, I try to take each chance I get. This is what I wish for everybody, in whatever situation you find yourself, start to do something with nothing. This book started with just a simple idea. You can not find anything like this on the Internet, this compilation, this narrative. It’s something we had to bring together with enormous work. And here we are. I think in our digital, splattered times sometimes you have to make something which is real. That you can sit with and focus on in silence and really take time alone with it.