Jewelry for nerds

Most book clubs, they say, only last a few months, a year if the members are lucky. We are anomaly, like a 50-year Hollywood marriage or people today going 10 minutes without looking at their smartphones.

So, what does my book club have to do with jewelry, you might ask? It relates because of the literature-themed jewelry I recently discovered from a Brooklyn, N.Y.-based company called Out of Print.

Out of Print got its start making apparel and accessories featuring licensed cover art from some of the most iconic tomes in history, i.e. a The Great Gatsby phone case. The phone case is nice, though as a child who spent a lot of time in libraries, one of my favorites being the B.F. Jones Memorial Library in Aliquippa, I am more partial to the library card phone case.

Eventually, Out of Print expanded into costume jewelry, though the interpretations are much less literal: Holden Caulfield’s hat from J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, Scout and Boo feathers from To Kill a Mockingbird, a necklace containing lines from Moby-Dick.

Moby Dick necklace, $30: “As for me I am tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote. I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts.” – Herman Melville

I understand that it is not fine jewelry--the pieces are brass with 14-karat gold plating and are priced between $30 and $34 retail.

But the pieces are affordable to many people and, what’s more, it’s fun. It gives jewelers the chance to put together a really interesting event, such as a book club-themed night. It brings people into the store that may otherwise not have entered--thinking they can’t afford fine jewelry--and gives them a chance to see the rest of your beautiful merchandise.

Imagine, for example, if it was a book club like mine, where the membership is largely female, between the ages of 30 and 37 and almost all single. That’s a lot of women in the store that either can and want to buy for themselves or may be getting married in the next few years, and will remember the store when they need bridal jewelry.

Out of Print does both retail and wholesale and retailers can sign up for a wholesale account here or email the company at wholesale@outofprintclothing.com. In addition, the company says that it will be expanding the line later this year.