Wanderlust + Co’s partnership with NYC community favorite Rubirosa helped cement its new store … More
Viral female-founded jewelry brand Wanderlust + Co is expanding Stateside. The playful and accessibly priced label has chosen New York City and Philadelphia for its first U.S. brick and mortar locations—on Bleecker Street and the King of Prussia Mall respectively.
While Malayia based Wanderlust + Co has its roots as a digital-first brand, it has already established five locations across Asia in Malaysia and Singapore and is stocked with some 400 retailers worldwide. The U.S. region, however, accounts for 40% of global website traffic and conversions together with a 20-25% repeat purchase rate among U.S. shoppers.
According to CEO and founder Jenn Low, these permanent spaces were also a response to insights gathered from a series of high-performing U.S. pop-ups together with intimate media dinners and one-on-one meetings. They demonstrated significantly increased conversion when people could physically engage with the product.
“We saw at first hand how much customers valued the opportunity to experience our pieces in real life,” she said. “Those moments affirmed that our community was ready for a space where they could connect with the brand in person.”
The offering of these stores tap into broader spectrum market trends such as city specific products and personalisation services which are key when it comes to drawing customers in-store and and building a local community.
Wanderlust + Co’s New York store.
Jewelry with local energy
Taking its cue from key luxury industry players like Le Labo and Christian Dior which pull focus on local, city specific products, Wanderlust created a whimsical pavé studded gold necklace with a charm in the shape of a pizza slice bedecked with pink pavé pepperoni in homage to New York.
The novelty marks the latest addition to the brand’s popular ‘Food Lovers’ series featuring fries, pretzels, dumplings and ravioli. In terms of broader trends, other recent hits include the Gen-Z brand’s flip phone necklaces which successfully tapped into fashion’s current fixation with all things Y2K.
When Wanderlust launched in 2010, it rode the wave of the e-commerce revolution and enjoyed early viral success via what one would now describe as astute product placement and seeding with influencers like Leandra Medine and stylists such as Monica Rose leading to coverage in Teen Vogue and celebrity traction with the likes of Gigi Hadid.
However, Lowe maintains that those early days were “truly organic.”
“I hand wrote notes and packed pieces myself, sending them off to women I admired for their style as well as grit, like Eva Chen and Aimees Song. There was no real ‘strategy’ other than sharing what I loved with people who inspired me.”
“Today while that kind of visibility still means a lot, our focus is very much on community.”
For New York, Wanderlust has partnered with NYC pizzeria Rubirosa on co-branded pizza delivery boxes for the restaurant’s famous Tie Dye pizzas alongside the chance to win one of the limited edition necklaces.
Moving forward, this kind of community driven creative storytelling will combine with further limited drops and exclusive collaborations, she says.
Wanderlust + Co pizza slice necklace.
Personalisation of jewelry and emotional resonance
While appealing in particular to a Gen-Z consumer, personalisation and storytelling amplify the emotional resonance of jewelry. The New York and Philadelphia stores both offer on-site piercing alongside personalisation services such as welding, engraving and a jewelry adjacent ‘patch bar’ where customers can personalise canvas key-chains, choosing from a series of iron-on designs—”allowing customers to bring their stories to life, making each piece uniquely theirs.”
“That connection to meaning is what keeps our community coming back. Whether it’s a gift to mark a milestone, or a charm you engraved on a whim—it becomes part of your story.”
Sustainable production
Setting it apart from more mass produced counterparts, the small-batch jewelry done in recycled brass, 925 sterling silver or solid gold includes many hand crafted elements more common to the luxury industry—from initial sketches and sampling via 3D printed wax moulds to the setting, enamel painting and polishing processes.
All partner factories are BSCI, SA 8000, and ISO 14001 certified while pieces are shower safe, hypoallergenic and feature game changing magnetic closures on bracelets and necklaces. Each is tested by humans for 30 days before going to market.
The appetite for accessibly priced quality jewelry continues to grow. Another popular D2C instagram favorite Ana Luisa recently established its second New York store, joining the likes of Majuri and Catbird while Danish jewelry brand Pandora will open its first U.S. flagship in Las Vegas this summer.
