Sonya Soltes, a stylist, costume designer, and trendy businesswoman, is presently dedicating a new LUTIKI campaign to research the mystical implications of the city in which she manufactures her brand’s jewellery.
LUTIKI is a brilliantly designed, gender-fluid jewellery line. Each drop is modelled after a movie episode, with all elements thematically complimenting one another. Sonya, the label’s originator, created a cinematographic storey around the brand as a consequence of her extensive experience in video creation.
The most recent campaign, LUTIKI watching, is a visual study of the environment in which Sonya creates her items. The designer has been snapping in Kyiv, Ukraine, for several days with photographer Vasilina Vrublevskaya, without the use of storyboards or professional models.
“The main question was whether a piece of jewellery transforms not only a person but also the environment,” explains Sonya. ‘We pay attention to habits that go unnoticed: when someone is wearing a coiled elastic band on the wrist or a plastic hair crab attached to a bag. With changing their qualities comes a transformation from everyday life objects to objects of desire.”
In the visual study, the duo captured the way the environment resonated with the jewellery pieces. Music conservatory students, parishioners of Frolovsky Monastery, pigeons from the Botanical garden became part of the campaign. Within an interview with Sonya below, we understand the inner-working of LUTIKI.
Tell me about your backstory, how was your upbringing and how did you navigate into the jewellery industry?
It all started with me working as a costume designer on various video production projects. Quite often when creating a look I focused on jewellery as the final point in completing the character’s outfit. Jewellery has always been my sphere of professional interest. Later, when I started my own brand, most of the products were clothes, but I still decided to implement jewellery to complete the looks, emphasize the aesthetics and philosophy of the brand.
When the quarantine started, I especially felt overproduction in the clothing market. I then decided to solely focus on jewellery, to me, it is more meaningful.
I read you were a costume designer before, how does this translate into your work today?
When working on a new design I research the future piece, draw sketches and do multiple fittings. This process is the same as with styling – when I create looks for advertisement videos or work with the scripts while creating a character. This awareness and thoughtfulness in working on costumes naturally transformed into working on designs.
How did your brand LUTIKI come about? Where did the idea arise? How long did it take to create etc?
I came up with an idea for the brand about three years ago. At that time I worked on both advertising videos and short films. It’s a very fast, very dynamic industry and I wanted to capture that spirit. Again, I wanted to find a continuation of my professional path. The idea was to create a brand that would also be a video clip, a cinematographic episode of a series. This set the framework within which the brand further acquired its philosophy and key ideas.
This didn’t take long, I started LUTIKI while working on several projects in parallel. I liked the speed and I tried to do it very quickly. In April, I launched the production of all the planned products and in June we already launched.
Your brand’s items are gender fluid and sustainably produced, can you elaborate on these goals as a jewellery label?
I am always super excited to see guys wear our jewellery. This emphasizes that our products have a universal meaning and are not subject to mental boundaries of any kind. The most demanded items are the neckpieces and our logo ring.
Another key value is that my brand has nothing in common with mass overproduction or mass market. We carry zero stock, make all of our items to order within 3-5 working days and collaborate with local jewellers.
I read that you consider a plastic hair scrunchie as a cultural phenomenon and an artefact – can you elaborate on this?
I believe that in every decade, every generation has its own iconic artefacts that are captured in photos, videos, and other types of content. And after a while, we recognize them and can determine exactly what kind of period it was, what was in fashion, aesthetics, style. This is what an artefact is, it is always within the frame of reference.
In addition, I have a passion for onlooking people using different objects for completely different purposes than they were intended. For instance, how women all around the world wear their plastic scrunchies as bracelets on their wrists. I love to research this and incorporate it with my work.
What are your three biggest rules when creating your designs?
I focus on functionality and aesthetics and convenience. It is important to me that the items are easy and comfortable to wear, do not slip or affect movement.
We love your fashion accessories, especially the ‘LUTIKI Logo Ring’, how did you come up with this specific design?
I wanted to somehow consolidate the name not only in the logo but also in the object itself. So I worked specifically with graphics and how they can be turned into an object. The simplest way turned out to loop it into a ring.
What are your personal favourite items, and why?
My favourite piece is our hair clip. It is very comfortable, aesthetic and multifunctional. It is the most convenient item that I always have with me, together with my phone.
What are the next steps for LUTIKI, what should we look out for?
We are working on new concepts and planning on releasing new meaningful jewellery pieces. I am very conscious about our collection being a curated range of objects with each of them representing a significant notion or phenomenon.