Marc Bridge’s At Present Goes Bold in Latest Jewelry Collaboration

By Karen Dybis | December 10, 2024

After decades of working in Ben Bridge stores and acting as a problem solver for his family’s jewelry business, Marc Bridge (pictured) founded At Present, and he says the online platform is shaking up jewelry curation through partnerships with creatives such as fashion influencer Jalil Johnson.

“The game needs to be changed,” says Bridge, a fifth-generation jeweler whose family manages the Ben Bridge company. “Jewelry needs to be less precious. I like to joke that we’re not precious about being precious.”

Johnson, a New York City–based stylist, writer, and podcaster, is At Present’s stylist in residence and helped develop its newest collection, Bold. The pieces use some of Johnson’s favorite gemstones—blue sapphire, opal, lapis lazuli, and diamond (note that their initials spell bold)—and include gender-neutral bracelets and rings with a circle-in-a-square design.

Bold Jalil Johnson — *Stylist, writer, and influencer Jalil Johnson wears an earring, ring, and bangle from the Bold collection he co-created for At Present.*

With At Present, which debuted in 2020, Bridge has established a place where jewelry wearers and artisans can find each other. The site serves as a matchmaker between the two, Bridge says.

“On the one side, the consumer wants something interesting and unique. But they don’t know where to go and who to trust. On the supply side, artists are saying, ‘I am creating something unique, but I don’t know how to find customers,’” he explains.

“Coming from my background, I never thought about how hard it was to find manufacturing,” Bridge continues. “Then, through At Present, I started talking to people who were trying to build businesses, and they couldn’t get manufacturers to take their calls. They were losing market share to other people because they couldn’t produce their projects.

*The Bold bangle ($1,195 in silver) spells the word* bold with the gemstones at its corners—blue sapphire, opal, lapis lazuli, and diamond.

“So much of what we are doing is helping great artists by doing all of the things they don’t know how to do or don’t want to do or have a competitive advantage in doing,” he adds. “That way, they can focus on what they do well, which is create amazing things.”

The next challenge was how to spread the word about At Present, its partner designers, and the fun shoppers can have when fine jewelry is demystified, Bridge says. This was when Bridge reached out to Johnson for his expertise. In his Substack newsletter, Consider Yourself Cultured, Johnson shares his ideas about fashion and its influence on society, his interest in jewelry history, and his design inspirations.

During Bold’s design meetings, Johnson suggested bringing acrostic jewelry into the At Present collections. Acrostic jewelry uses the symbolism of certain gemstones and other design elements to present a message, and Johnson wanted that kind of storytelling to apply not only to jewelry people receive as gifts but also to pieces they buy for themselves.

Johnson is also a proponent of genderless apparel and accessories, and he encourages clients to wear pieces like the Bold bangle either as a bracelet or strung on a simple satin ribbon as a pendant.

Pictured in silver ($275) with a white diamond in the square, the Bold earrings—featuring a baroque freshwater pearl and round lapis lazuli—are also available in gold plate ($245) or 14k gold ($995) with blue sapphire.

At Present introduced the Bold collection to influencers and the fashion media in September, and the first pieces have gone out to customers. Early feedback has been gratifying, Bridge says.

He says At Present exists in part to help its customers discover jewelry that resonates with them personally and highlights everyday achievements, like learning a new skill or getting that dream job.

“That’s at the very core of At Present—you’re not waiting for the impossible, perfect life moment. You’re celebrating the now,” says Bridge. “Jewelry has a smaller share of the wallet than it deserves based on how good the product is. If you’re only looking at jewelry as a gift of love, that’s too narrow. It misses why jewelry is meaningful, and that’s because we bring it into our lives at important junctions and build stories around it.”

(Photos courtesy of At Present)