There is a big world out there

For Fiorina Golotta making jewellery was a passion, but unlike many business owners, she never dared imagine the success her business could achieve. Coming from a fashion background, Golotta had worked with clothes designers and as a make-up artist, but it wasn't until she was 24 that she started taking private lessons in how to make jewellery.

Golotta started out making jewellery from her kitchen table and selling her creations at local markets. Before long she was being commissioned to create pieces. Through word of mouth her brand, Fiorina Jewellery, started to establish itself.

Golotta's fashion connections served her well and before long she had started wholesaling her products. When the business launched 15 years ago, she says it was a different retail environment and "the more you had, the more you sold".

Golotta ran the business through a wholesaling model "for a long time", but now she owns a shop in the Melbourne suburb of Armadale and she employs eight people. While the business now turns over $1 million annually and she hopes to see further growth through the upcoming launch of her online store, Golotta intends to maintain the "intimate environment" of her small business.

Women's Agenda sister publication SmartCompany spoke to Golotta about her transition into eCommerce, the inspiration for her designs and an endless copyright battle.

Owning a now well-established business, Golotta is able to spend the majority of her time designing.

"As the business has grown, I don't have to do everything anymore. Time is what makes the business function and now I have that luxury of time I get to design, although sometimes I get side-tracked when there are practical things to do.

"For me it's a strange blessing that I can be creative and still make money. To call yourself an artist is a luxury and there is the notion that you have to be starving, but when you're running a business you have to let that go," she says.

On the day of the interview, Golotta was preparing to go to Hong Kong the following day to source materials.

"I do travel often to source materials, but it's an excuse. There is a big world out there and it's inspiring. I love Turkey and Italy, I'm Mediterranean so there is an immediate affiliation with their coins and their culture."

Golotta's designs are inspired by her travels and she takes influences from a variety of other cultures, such as India.

"I love its aesthetic and its an opulence," she says.

Golotta's original mentors were old jewellers and in her creations is the careful precision and artistry taught to her by the "true craftsmen".

Golotta is currently building an online store, although she says it's the exclusivity of her creations which has allowed her to avoid the pressure placed on retailers by the growth of online businesses.

"Thank god what I do is not that accessible online, it's a specialty product, it's bespoke and people are still responding to something handmade.

"The designs are also not really seasonal fashion-based, I'm still making pieces which have been in the range for 15 years," she says.

Golotta resisted the online push at the outset, but now says it's the way the industry is going.

"It's a way of testing the water internationally. We are always getting international enquiries and I post orders to America and to England because there are a number of Aussies there.
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