November's Hottest Designer: Alexis Bittar

If you were a regular in the Manhattan club scene in the 80s (and we know you have your secrets), you were probably hanging around the likes of our friend, Alexis Bittar. Yet this party animal made a rather smooth transition out of the world of booze and into the world of BANGLES. Alexis had created an empire, completing revamping modern jewelry trends and sending chic ripples of inspiration into countless awe-inspired designer’s collections. The gorgeous Holiday ’11 Collection is coined “Miss Havisham”: it’s sexy and slick with hues of blush and black seamlessly carved into shapes of “liquid” and “fringe”. Yet the new Cruise ’12 Collection, to arrive at Peridot before Valentine’s day (hint hint), draws inspiration from the opulently disgruntled estate, Grey Gardens. Moody charcoals and mints frame and vine and snarl, creating an ensemble on their own, requiring only the simplest  canvas of jeans or a little black dress to drape over. The designs are created in New York, a real feat these days,  and everything is made by hand. It takes 6-7 people just to hand-carve and hand-paint one Lucite bangle. If that doesn’t make you feel like you’ve got luxury dripping off your wrists, what will?!