Hasta La Ideas

by Anna Carnick

Shutting its doors in 2005 for renovation, much of the interior of the infamous Plaza Hotel was broken down and put up for sale. Jewelery designer Lisa Salzer of Lulu Frost recognized this as an opportunity to marry pieces from the hotel with her own design sensibilities, resulting in one-off vintage necklaces, bracelets and brooches (click on any image for expanded view).

Her new collection, aptly called Plaza, is comprised of the hotel’s room letters and numbers she came across in a local antique shop, often accented with distressed silk ribbon and other baubles such as crystals chandelier crystals. Embracing the spirit of Eloise, the collection has been so well received that most of the original pieces have already been sold. Salzer recently cast the remaining letters and numbers, replicating them in bronze to share with the growing Lulu Frost audience.

Describing her inspiration, Salzer says, “From the time I was a little girl growing up with a grandmother in the estate jewelry business to being an art history major in college, I have always had a fascination with jewelry and the past. Being able to combine vintage jewelry with modern elements to create something totally new and fresh is a huge passion of mine, and I’m so thrilled I am able to do so on a daily basis.”

For future collections Salzer explains that Lulu Frost is “working on collections that are a bit easier for us to replicate exactly and produce more efficiently, yet still keep the vintage aesthetic alive in every piece. By doing this, we are able to reach out to the masses and grow as a company, though we of course will still always sell our one-of-a-kind and vintage staples that Lulu Frost is known for.”

Fittingly, the Lulu Frost Plaza collection is available exclusively at the reopened Plaza boutique, priced at $240-$400.