Thanks to first-year Christina Casper’s handmade jewelry business, Stupid Jupiter Jewelry, brightly-colored floral necklaces are creating a sense of community among students on the Boston campus.
Casper, a visual media arts major, said she has a passion for creating things that extend beyond the classroom with her jewelry business. Casper has always had a knack for creating jewelry, and her crafty hobby is catching the eyes of many Emerson students through her Instagram account, @stupidjupiterjewelry.
“I always liked making bracelets and necklaces and stuff,” Casper said. “Now this is just my necklace hobby.”
Stupid Jupiter Jewelry started with Casper making necklaces for herself and her friends, eventually growing to her Instagram account, where the necklaces are currently being sold via Google form. Casper said her friends encouraged her to start Stupid Jupiter Jewelry after last semester.
Freshman Mason Standish was one of the first people Casper made a necklace for and helped encourage her to start selling them.
“She gave me a necklace that she made while she was back at home during break, and I thought it was super dope, so I put it on immediately, and I’m wearing that one right now,” Standish said.
Casper said she is mainly selling her necklaces to Emerson students at this time, with free delivery to the Little Building and other residence halls on the Boston campus. Recently, she added shipping all across the country for an additional $5, so now the brightly-colored necklaces can be soon spotted nationwide. A total of 85 necklaces have been sold to primarily first-year students, but also a few upperclassmen, non-Emerson students, and other shipments outside of Boston. She hopes to expand her business into an Etsy shop over the summer to grow her business.
“People every day, pretty much, would ask me about the necklaces,” Standish said. “It made sense for her to start selling them. Everyone in the student body was pretty interested in them.”
While walking around campus, you can spot Casper’s brightly-colored necklaces with a flower pendant all around—whether you’re in Tatte or the elevator headed up to your room in the Little Building. Students will recognize Casper’s jewelry and strike up a conversation with each other, building a small community during an isolated semester.
“[Stupid Jupiter Jewerly] is a bit of a cult,” Standish said. “Every day in the elevator, I see someone who has one on, and then it’s like, ‘Oh my God.’ You immediately have this thing in common. That’s been one of the most fun thing about it.’”
The necklaces are made of glass beads, elastic string, and a flower pendant. When purchasing the necklaces, customers can pick what color beads and flower pendants they want.
“They are really comfortable,” Casper said. “They are super stretchy, durable, reliable. I think it’s really cool [that] a lot of people like them and they wear them, and not just buy them to support [Stupid Jupiter Jewerly], they wear them, too.”
First-year visual media arts major Michael Rivera was one of the first customers of Stupid Jupiter Jewelry. Rivera said he often sees students in Boston Common wearing Casper’s jewelry and sparks up a conversation with them. He said he loves the community aspect that the jewelry has created, even wearing his necklace during the time of his interview with The Beacon.
“It’s made with love,” Rivera said. “Casper puts a lot of care into it, and she was telling me a couple of weeks ago, when it first started out, she wanted to create a community around the necklaces. You could see someone with it, and you just start talking about it, and then you become friends that way.”
Casper said she loves creating things in her free time. Stupid Jupiter Jewelry only takes orders for her necklaces via Google form, which is linked in her Instagram account @stupidjupiterjewelry.
