Long Island, N.Y.–based jewelry brand Natalie O. explores the legacy of the 1920s—a glamorous, rebellious decade when women redefined what it meant to be modern—with Café Society, its latest collection.
Café Society features rings, pendants, earrings, and bracelets in 18k yellow gold with natural diamonds. The jewelry pieces incorporate the fringe detailing and geometric lines associated with the art deco era while offering a contemporary take on that design style. Retail prices range from around $2,250 to $86,000.
Brand founder Natalie Katz O’Brien designed the collection to evoke scenes from New York and Paris in the 1920s, a world where women—free-spirited, jubilant, and adorned with diamonds—linger in café corner booths, stroll through grand manor halls, and enjoy themselves at elegant soirées, lively salons, and clandestine gatherings.
Three famous women of the time served as muses for the collection’s hero pieces (all pictured in this story): singer-dancer Josephine Baker, movie star Jean Harlow, and socialite and literary wife Zelda Fitzgerald.
Here, O’Brien talks with JCK about the women behind her new collection, finding parallels between the 1920s and today, and the reasons storytelling remains at the heart of her design process.
What sparked the idea to build an entire collection around iconic women of the 1920s? Was there a particular moment or discovery that set this concept in motion?
There absolutely was a defining moment. Café Society was born at Hotel Lutetia in Paris, in the Josephine Baker Suite. There was this huge mural of Josephine on the ceiling, and my terrace faced the Eiffel Tower. I was there with my daughter, my sister, and my niece, and there was something about being surrounded by women who have always encouraged me to express myself, in a city that celebrates creativity and reinvention, that shifted something in me.
Looking at the mural, I started thinking about other women during that time and comparing what they were going through in the 1920s to what women are going through today. As women, moms, wives, friends, and nurturers, we can get stuck in roles that sometimes we can’t find our way out of. That was something I was going through personally as well, so being there in Paris was almost a lightbulb moment. It prompted me to start sketching. It took about a year for the collection to evolve into what it is today, but that was really the beginning.
Why do you think women like Josephine Baker, Zelda Fitzgerald, and Jean Harlow continue to captivate us nearly a century later?
Each woman brought something completely different to my creative process. Josephine Baker inspired me through the way she used music and performance to express her identity. Zelda Fitzgerald in the art world, married to an incredible novelist but still finding her own way and her own voice. Jean Harlow had this confidence and glamour that felt completely unapologetic. What connects them all is that they weren’t afraid to embrace who they were.
When designing a piece inspired by a real person, how do you avoid creating a costume or caricature? What makes a design feel like an interpretation rather than a tribute?
It was never about designing jewelry for the person, [but was about] what that person represented. I was interested in translating a feeling: Their confidence, passion, individuality, and pursuit of self-expression became the inspiration, rather than anything literal. I always want the person wearing my jewelry to tell their own story. The collection revolves around taking those ideas of freedom and individuality and making them your own.
The 1920s are often romanticized, but they were also a period of enormous social change. Did that spirit of transformation influence your designs?
Absolutely. More than anything, it was the freedom of that period that inspired me the most. Women were cutting their hair, smoking cigarettes in public, dancing in fountains, wearing shorter dresses, and expressing themselves in ways they hadn’t before. It was a defining moment where women stopped asking for permission.
When I was in Paris, I couldn’t stop comparing that time to the time we’re living through now. My designs are about celebrating women who continue to evolve, continue to express themselves, and continue to embrace life with the same freedom and passion that inspired me on that balcony overlooking the Eiffel Tower.
How much research goes into a collection like this? Were there books, photographs, films, or archival materials that helped shape your vision?
Once I had the initial idea, that’s when the deep searching began. I spent hours researching online, collecting old books and photographs, and studying the architecture of the period. I was fascinated by the shift from the fluidity of art nouveau to the clean lines of art decoit reflected what was happening culturally as well, as women were cutting their hair, shortening their skirts, and redefining themselves. Architecture and history are my roots, and they’ve always been what drives me as an artist.
Jean Harlow is known as the original platinum blonde, and she was one of Hollywood’s earliest style icons. Beyond glamour, what qualities were you hoping to capture in the Harlow cuff?
Jean Harlow represented both strength and beauty, and I wanted the cuff to reflect that balance. One side is more structured, while the other is softer. It speaks to the strength she needed to succeed in Hollywood, alongside the femininity and glamour she was so well known for. People often think it’s two separate pieces, but it’s actually one cuff bringing those two sides together. I feel that really captures who she was.
Zelda Fitzgerald is often remembered just through the lens of F. Scott Fitzgerald, her husband. Did you consciously try to tell her story on her own terms?
I did. The Zelda I designed around was the woman I came to know through my research—not necessarily the version history has remembered through F. Scott Fitzgerald. I drew from the beauty, sadness, and fire I saw from her. This is how I connected the diablo setting to her. She was electric; that setting is tangibly sharp, shocking, and gives you the feeling I imagine you would have when meeting her.
How did Baker’s movement, confidence, and stage presence translate into the shape of the Josephine earrings?
Josephine had a hypnotic strength and beauty about her. It isn’t so much the design itself, but the feeling it brings to wearing the earrings and to those who see them. They are a statement piece—Josephine deserved nothing less.
If you could design a piece inspired by any woman from history who isn’t part of this collection, who would it be and why?
This is a big question, because there will be many to come. Currently I am working on a collection to represent one of the most incredible women in history—my mom. She is one of the most amazing women I know. Strong, kind, smart, philanthropic, generous, and madly obsessed with the home I grew up in on Long Island, her gardens, and all things red. Stay tuned. My sketchbook is filling up.
Do you see Café Society becoming an ongoing series featuring other influential women, or is this intended as a stand-alone collection?
That is hard to say because every time I go back to a city where I’ve previously created something, more ideas are born. At the moment, my creative process is flourishing in water, flowers, and elements of nature, as opposed to architecture and history. But I never say never, because when it is a piece of me, it is always there.
Top: Harlow cuff bracelet in 18k yellow gold with 3.82 cts. t.w. diamonds, $86,000; Natalie O.
- Subscribe to the JCK News Daily
- Subscribe to the JCK Special Report
- Follow JCK on Instagram: @jckmagazine
- Follow JCK on X: @jckmagazine
- Follow JCK on Facebook: @jckmagazine
