Bold, round discs mark new jewelry by Eastern Market vendor Golshah Agdasi. Photo by Elizabeth Festa
If you have ever liked collecting colored stones as a kid, moved up to Mood Rings and Secret Agent gadgets for the sleekness but the aps, admired jazzy cufflinks but wanted to forgo the shirt itself, or merely wanted to adorn yourself with a shot of color perfect and complete unto itself, you will find that the new jewelry of Golshah Agdasi beckons among the many wares set out every weekend at the Eastern Market extended flea market.
Agdasi’s orb-shaped glass pendants, rings, cufflink bracelets and earrings are a smooth, milky opaque surface of carefully chosen hues — from blood orange to pink satin — and run from a few centimeters in diameter to a couple of inches, all the better to adorn you with, my dear.
A bright pendant in moss, Mediterranean blue or lemon yellow will do for a neutral DC outfit what little else in its size or weight has rarely done for a Hill look — make it unique, bold and fluid.
“One of my costumers said, ‘I love the way you have underestimated your jewelry.’ Then I knew I have done it,” said Agdasi, who lives in Takoma Park, Maryland.
To me, they look like tiny planets as careful children imagine them hanging in the sky, but Agdasi had something else in mind when she created them. One can’t blame them for being so evocative when one understands in what kind of imagination they were born.
“Since I was little and growing up I attended a ritual feast every 19 days in people’s houses,” said Agdasi, who has been selling at Eastern Market for about 16 years and is Persian, she says, from Iran. “As part of the ritual, people with beautiful voices chant prayers and we [sit] quietly and meditating,[and] during meditation I used to look at the fascinating and rich colors of the carpet…I was playing with the colors [in] my eyes every time after the feast, when I went to bed, as soon as I closed my eyes the colors…always circles appeared and revolved in my dream, I believe part of the ritual had a role in my new collection.”
The prayer carpets are rich, detailed, and intricate, but Agdasi has apparently isolated those filaments of color into discrete pieces of jewelry.
“When I migrated to the United States, the first thing I noticed and adopted was the simplicity of Americans and their life…where I come from everything is elaborated, especially colors, so I decided to merge the East and the West and bring happy colors to my jewelry as simple as possible,” she explained.
Her signature collection is relatively new — she also sells and sold the normal range of hoops and silver delicacies and beads found at many other jewelry stalls in the area, but I have seen less and less of that. The glass orbs, set in brass, came to life after a walk about two years ago where she strolled through the market “up and down for a few times.” Nothing caught her eye.
“Every jewelry on every table looked alike to me. I wanted to create something totally different…it took me more than six months to come up with my new line,” she said. She premiered the circles a year and a-half ago and they have been a hot item at the Market on weekends ever since.
Her so-called “happy circles” have become very popular, with the bright orange colors among the most coveted. Agdasi sells more necklaces than any other item in the line. They range in price from $20 to $44. Most of the “happy circles” start at around $20 for smaller pieces and go up to about $70. Customer orders and glass set in gold plate or sterling silver plate cost more.
I know the ring I purchased, in an uncharacteristic neutral color — perhaps the pink of a lamb’s ear — garners all sorts of compliments from all types of people, from insurance lobbyists to writers to barristas to a business owner who professes not to like “stuff,” and who uses a rubber band as a wallet. But she likes the ring Agdasi crafted. And that’s after the ring has gone through the wash and been pulled, caught on a fence and come under attack by young space warriors with swords.
Agdasi’s tent is now usually set up on 7th Street itself, across from Tunnicliffs and the Hospice Association building area, mid-block.