A background in jewellery design, first at Central Saint Martins in London and, later, at Tiffany & Co, inspired Charlotte Asherson when creating her own jewellery brand, Phoria. An emphasis on both bold design codes and wearability - pieces can be worn in multiple ways - has set the tone for her oversized, fun aesthetic. Here, Asherson talks to us about creating your own distinctive aesthetic and the inspiration behind the brand.
Wallpaper*: Can you tell us a bit about your background? How have you translated this experience into creating your own distinctive aesthetic?
Charlotte Asherson: Design has always been everything to me and I’m lucky enough to have turned a passion into a career, but I have worked hard for it. Graduating from Central Saint Martins having studied Jewellery Design led me to work for Tiffany & Co. under the then Creative Director, Francesca Amfitheatrof. Her belief in my work really instilled the confidence within me that I needed in the industry.
Freelancing taught me that working for myself was the way forward for me but what if I could design what I wanted to design under my own terms and really help people stand out creatively? That is a lot of where the Phoria brand came from, wearing jewellery on your own terms without being constrained to just one way to wear. Creativity is freedom and that’s what I want to empower with the Phoria range.
W: What are the design codes which define your brand?
CA: Phoria is rooted in a simple, yet powerful, aesthetic whilst creating jewellery that goes beyond the conventional. I wanted to reimagine the traditional to create interchangeable, transformable pieces that enable you to recreate the ways you can wear them.
Every piece has been designed to be redesigned by the wearer, to encourage personalised styling, versatility and creativity. For example, our bracelets are all modular, meaning made to build so can be worn either alone, or combined and recontextualised. They’ve been carefully designed so that any length, finish or style variation of chain achieves a perfectly proportioned and stylistically seamless build of necklace every time.
Quality and craftsmanship are also at the heart of Phoria; with my design background I truly believe it’s important that all of the pieces are made from the best materials, are carefully and ethically sourced and are handmade. I believe in slow fashion and this ethos needs to be reflected in the detail and care that goes into each Phoria piece.
I’m also heavily inspired by industrial aesthetics and hardware and this filters through into the brand's urban edge.
W: What have been the main challenges you have encountered in the production of your pieces?
CA: Ah there have been many! Finding a supplier that shares the same values as me and that I could trust took time. They needed to share my vision of transparency, responsible and ethical sourcing and I needed to also make sure that I could work closely with them every step of the way. Quality over quantity is incredibly important to me so I needed to source genuine craftsmen that could make everything by hand, rather than the majority of suppliers that are larger factories that mass produce on assembly lines.
One of the most tedious challenges was every aspect of the packaging. It was an incredibly painstaking process as attention to detail is everything for me. Everything down to the way it looks, the way it is made and the way it arrives is so important. I also not only wanted to adopt a sustainable approach to packaging but wanted to develop it so that it can be used and last long after unboxing your piece and quality in this industry at a level where it is affordable is somewhat lacking. A lot of packaging is made in China and with that generally comes long lead times, high minimums and questionable quality so this was something that took me a lot of time and effort to source and get right as as a start up you need to be so careful.
