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"How many times have you checked out another girl&amp;#x27;s outfit and then mentally &amp;quot;pinned&amp;quot; everything she has on? Guilty as charged! So, instead of standing idly by making mental Pinterest boards, I decided to ask some women I find irresistibly chic to give me a peek into their closets. For this week&amp;#x27;s Chic Peek, our lovely photographer Miha and I headed over to Santa Monica to snap accessories designer and owner of Luv Aj, Amanda Thomas in her dual home/office/showroom space. Already a jewelry maven at a mere 25 years old, Amanda has been at it for 10 years. This is her story: During high school (yes, high school), she interned for a jewelry designer. Inspired by everything she was learning, she started dabbling on the side. Soon enough, she was selling her pieces at school to her friends. Then, like a true Hollywood story, while shopping at the L.A. fashion emporium Fred Segal, the head jewelry buyer spotted her wearing her own necklace and wanted to see more. She went home and whipped up 20 more pieces, and Luv Aj was born. It&amp;#x27;s an affordable line of affordable with loads of chains, statement pieces, spikes, studs in a myriad of finishes, and Amanda tells us &amp;quot;the Luv Aj girl is the kind of girl who plans her outfits around her accessories, not her clothes.&amp;quot; Check it! Amanda, outside her home office in a Friend of Mine tuxedo vest, white leather Winston Wolfe skirt, and Jeffrey Campbell for Free People shoes Her upcoming collection: &amp;quot;My upcoming line, out in November, is called the Petite Punk Collection, which is a range of dainty spikes and studs. They&amp;#x27;re very simple, but a wearable version of the classic punk stud. I started with the stud and then created a charm necklace, a hand-piece, a stackable ring set from there.&amp;quot; The Luv Aj Oversize Sharktooth Necklace in matte black with Swarovksi crystals, on display on with her book collection. How she gets dressed each day: &amp;quot;My look heavily depends on my schedule for the day. If I&amp;amp;#8217;m shipping orders, it&amp;amp;#8217;s J Brand jeans, an LNA tee, and my Nikes. If it&amp;amp;#8217;s a meeting where I have to look presentable, it&amp;amp;#8217;s lots of leather and a dope pair of Alexander Wang heels.&amp;quot; At the entrance to her work space in a T by Alexander Wang dress, Luv Aj leather bomber jacket from her upcoming leather line, and Alexander Wang shoes Her organizational style: &amp;quot;Like a Virgo! I&amp;amp;#8217;m hyper organized and very type-A. I love lists, labels, the whole shebang. I&amp;amp;#8217;m sure people think I&amp;amp;#8217;m nuts for the level of organization I keep but you cannot run your own company at 25 years old without having everything together.&amp;quot; In the Luv Aj showroom, with her coding system on both sides Her coveted piece of jewelry: &amp;quot;My Alexander McQueen ring&amp;amp;#8212;t&amp;#x27;s such a statement piece. My dad got me for Valentine&amp;amp;#8217;s Day, the day before McQueen died, so it&amp;#x27;s very sentimental.&amp;quot; Alexander McQueen skull ring in gold in the center with Luv Aj Sharktooth Earrings On her Kate Moss phase: &amp;quot;On my dresser I have a &amp;#x27;paint-by-numbers&amp;#x27; piece I created when I was in school. I could actually print one out now and you could do one at home. Kate has such an incredible library of editorials to get inspired by, so it became a little hobby of mine at the time.&amp;quot; Kate Moss art and assorted bijoux from the Luv Aj Sharktooth Collection. Her style, in three words: &amp;quot;Minimal. Tough. Black.&amp;quot; Amanda in her living room, sporting a Friend of Mine leather skirt, Givenchy tee and shoes, Luv Aj jewelry Her birthday gift of choice: &amp;quot;I have everyone pitch in to get me one kick-ass pair of shoes instead of a bunch of little presents. My favorite pair are the spinal-cord D-Squared platforms. They are monstrously tall and the heel is a whole human vertebrae (in plastic!). I cant go anywhere in them without getting comments.&amp;quot; The D-Squared vertebrae platforms in the center, surrounded by the rest of her collection What she pairs with Luv Aj: &amp;quot;I love Anita Ko and Eva Fehren, both do fine jewelry, which is a whole &amp;amp;#8216;nother world for me. I know little about what goes into working with precious stones, but I love their modern take on classic materials. I want a wedding ring from one of them!&amp;quot; On the wall of books: &amp;quot;Credit goes to my sister Claire Thomas. She&amp;amp;#8217;s the real bookworm, but I have some amazing design books I accumulated during college when I was a graphic design major. Lots of typography books, and even books that I made myself during school.&amp;quot; An irresistible shot...Claire&amp;#x27;s vintage Glamour cookbook from the 1950s Her secret shot for vintage shopping: &amp;quot;I love thrift shopping. There&amp;amp;#8217;s this vintage store on the central coast of California in Morro Bay called Treasures that is the mecca for cool knickknacks. It&amp;amp;#8217;s my best kept secret&amp;amp;#8212;half of the things on my bookshelves are from there.&amp;quot; Photoboothing with friends You can shop the collection on Luv Aj or at Shopbop. Do you have pieces of jewelry that are sentimental to you? Do you ever make your own jewelry? Hey, maybe you could end up like Amanda!"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.glamour.com/fashion/blogs/dressed/2013/08/chic-peek-luv-ajs-amanda-thoma>