CRAIG T. KOJIMA / CKOJIMA@STARBULLETIN.COM Robert Bruce Bielka, left, shows his Everlasting Lei design, a burst of sunflowers with 2.91 carats of diamonds, 44 carats of pink tourmalines set in 18K gold and platinum. It costs $96,000. Above, a trio of Robert Bruce Bielka's 18K gold pendants/charms.

Recognize a master jewelry
maker with a show of hands

---

By Nadine Kam
nkam@starbulletin.com

Robert Bruce Bielka remembers being tested immediately after making the move from Seattle to New York to find work as a jeweler. He was ordered by a master jewelry maker to show his hands.

"He looked at my hands and just said, 'OK.'"

Bielka was dumbfounded. It was years later during a tour of an old windmill in the Hamptons that he learned he had been judged by the same criterion as the wheel dressers who used steel chisels to resurface the millstones. Employers didn't need to see a résumé. They just needed to see bits of metal embedded in applicants' hands. Dressers with the best hand-eye coordination couldn't escape the slivers of metal that became embedded under their skin.

Bielka confesses to having drilled many a bit of metal into his fingers and has the dark spots, like tattoos, to prove it.

It's been far less painful to win over a clientele whose main concern is the quest for beauty. Bielka's got that covered. His pieces range from the elegant bursts of golden sunflowers to adorable "Bearlooms," Teddy bears fashioned from 18K gold and precious gems, all with moveable parts that allow them to hang from a necklace or charm bracelet or simply sit atop your jewel box while awaiting its next outing. An 18K "micro" Teddy measuring three-eighths of an inch tall starts at $550 without precious stones and runs about $660 with the stone eyes.

CRAIG T. KOJIMA / CKOJIMA@STARBULLETIN.COM From left is a baby bear with diamonds, a bear outfitted with rubies, and a Christmas kitten with emerald eyes. Each has moveable limbs so they can dangle or pose atop a jewelry box. Prices start at $550 for a "micro" bear. Note the detail on the kitten's paw

He was intrigued by the idea of movement, inspired by charms of the '30s, such as airplanes with rotating propellers and wheelbarrows with spinning wheels.

BIELKAWILLBE at Neiman Marcus today through Sunday with his wife, Regina, to introduce his bears and a holiday collection that includes a kitten in a Santa Claus cap. Plan to spend a few hours at the jewelry counter because it'll take that long to examine the detail on his many whimsical pieces.

A closer look at his "Everlasting Lei" of sunflowers -- no two petals alike -- with diamond centers, buds of pink tourmalines and green enamel leaves reveals a vine of gold hearts under the leaves, like a haku lei wrapped with 18K gold. The hearts also show up as clappers in a charm bracelet of golden jingling bells, just in time for the holidays.

A green tourmaline is set into a ring band covered in diamonds in such a way that a spray of diamond flowers seems to be embedded into the stone. And his animal charms are so detailed that the soles of their hooves and paws have the correct prints (even if most Labradors don't really wear a spot of nail polish on their toes).

There doesn't seem to be a whole lot Bielka can't do once he sets a goal, although he does admit to having been stumped when it came to coming up with the right footprints for his African savanna series of animal charms.

"It was a challenge," he said. "How does anyone know what the bottom of a rhinoceros' foot looks like? I looked at books but could not find that information. Finally, I went to the American Natural History Museum, and they had dioramas with the animals in them, and there in the mud were the footprints! I took a lot of pictures."

A little closer to home, he offers cat and dog charms, and in the course of meeting customers, he said, he's discerned yet another difference between cat and dog people.

CRAIG T. KOJIMA / CKOJIMA@STARBULLETIN.COM A monkey designed by Robert Bruce Bielka has moveable limbs and a swinging tail.

"Cat people will accept any cat figure, but dog people just want their breed."

He will do custom work but to date hasn't had any request for a particular breed of dog. He has made bulls for customers overseas and in one case reproduced a client's beloved tractor.

Some of his brooches pay homage to the 50th state with briolette-cut gems topped by pineapple crowns. The golden crowns can be unscrewed so that the stones can be changed to match different outfits.

"I was inspired by my grandfather, who had traveled to Asia, China and the Philippines and brought back great carvings and furniture."

Bielka never really knew his grandfather, who was a first lieutenant aboard the USS Utah and was killed at Pearl Harbor, but Bielka said the furniture and art work that filled the family's home "kept the feeling of Hawaii."

ALTHOUGH BIELKA'S pieces for women are decidedly feminine, he said they are often purchased by men who appreciate the technical aspects of his designs. He holds two patents for his innovations and was the first designer to win accreditation as a Jewelers of America Certified Master Bench Jeweler, able to execute his own designs.

Bielka was on his way to becoming an engineer, following in his father's footsteps, all the while feeling the pull of his creative nature while attending the University of Washington. Then, he met a jeweler and "something lit up." He had always appreciated jewelry in store windows and wondered how it was made but, coming from a middle-class background, had not been exposed to it. With his father's blessing, he changed his major to art and never looked back.

That was in 1971, the same year he and Regina met. She had walked into the shop where he worked, and hoped he would teach her to make Egyptian jewelry. That didn't work out when she was using a torch and accidentally set a dress on fire, but they clicked, and four years later the couple moved to New York without contacts or jobs lined up.

CRAIG T. KOJIMA / CKOJIMA@STARBULLETIN.COM A brooch of amethyst and turquoise pineapples has crowns that unscrew so the stones can be replaced to match different clothing ensembles.

"It was probably foolhardy," Bielka muses. He quickly got a job at Tiffany but wasn't happy there due to personality clashes.

From Tiffany, Bielka went to work for Cartier at $5 an hour. He struck out on his own in 1979 and incorporated as Bielka Inc. in 1981. Meanwhile, he and Regina were living in a tenement crawling with bugs (jeweled insects now form another part of his collection) and a bathroom that doubled as the kitchen. For a while, his work bench consisted of two crates.

But his workmanship was noticed, and soon he was designing one-of-a-kind pieces for such leading jewelry retailers as Fred Leighton, Mikimoto, Tiffany, Van Cleef & Arpels, Harry Winston, Chaumet and others. He also originated the Asprey Sunflower and Daisy collections, but all the while, "I was praying that they never came to see where the work was being done."

He missed New York's great late '70s punk and new-wave music scenes because he was afraid of leaving the house out of fear of being burglarized.

"The problem with being a jeweler was having so many valuables that I was personally responsible for. You didn't want to tell people what you were doing. It was very isolating. I never wanted to leave home, and when I did, I took the jewelry in my pockets."

Today, he runs his business from 57th Street in Manhattan and doesn't worry about meeting people, as long as they're nice. "When people first see the teddy bears, they always say, 'Oh, isn't that adorable.' Only nice people seem to like it. They never go to a nasty person."

Santa's still making his list. Better be good.

Meet Robert Bruce Bielka Where: Neiman Marcus Precious Jewels Salon, Level One When: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. today and tomorrow, and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday Admission: Free Call: 951-3449

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