Pattaraphan Salirathavibhaga developed a skill in accessories in her hometown of Bangkok, Thailand, where she trained as a bench jeweler. Fast forward to present-day, Pattaraphan graduated from Pratt Institute, launched a namesake brand, and returned to Bangkok, where she now roams country to country, collecting inspiration.

We spoke with the designer upon the launch of her campaign, ‘DREAMS,’ featuring The Pressure Collection. Pressure, inspired by city life’s discarded items and mental hardships, is matched with a campaign symbolic of love and inclusivity. Find out more in our conversation below:

The Pressure collection examines mental health and waste, specifically in urban environments. Why did you choose to highlight these topics?

Jewelry is a medium that I use to articulate and express my personal experience. I also find beauty and inspiration from ordinary things, including unwanted and overlooked items. What struck me the most when I was developing this collection was the discarded soda tabs on the streets of New York City. Although trash is a common sight in both cities I've lived in, somehow, these soda tabs first stuck in my mind in the summer of 2017 in NYC. Every time I went out, I'd notice them.

These soda tabs are essentially a symbol of leftover items from our often unconscious consumption patterns; used once to open the can of our favorite drink and so easily thrown away and forgotten. Also, since these soda tabs function through pressure, I started to associate them with anxiety and pressure that come with living in a metropolitan city. Growing up in an urban city like Bangkok and spending five years in New York City, I was often surrounded by close friends and family who deal with this type of pressure in their daily lives in a fast-paced environment. To me, this feeling of constantly being overwhelmed and feeling like you cannot control everything or too much is going on in your life is not a mental illness per se. However, I feel that we are all dealing with things or issues that influence our heads and mental state. With all these ideas, the main pieces of Pressure Collection came to life. They are reimagined in polished gold vermeil jewelry on your body. I love the irony and a new meaning I was able to give to them. More importantly, I decided to use these soda tabs in my collection as an homage not only to these two cities, but also my friends and family as a way to let them know that their anxiety, big or small, is okay and is acknowledged.

What are your views on NYC’s consumption and perception of luxury? How does NYC differ from Bangkok and other major cities abroad?

There are definitely some crossovers. Although malls are still a huge part of our lives here in Bangkok, e-commerce and Instagram brands are becoming part of the new shopping norms. Also, both Bangkokians and New Yorkers love to express their individualities. This is something I'm proud of both cities. People are willing to spend on items that can help reflect their individuality in their personal style.

People are familiar with how stylish New Yorkers are, but what people aren't familiar with is that Thai people also love fashion— we've got great style, especially street style, that are often inspired by the clash between old traditions and rapid urbanization of the whole country.

However, in the market at home, there are not as many "in-between brands" that offer something a bit more than low-end brands, but are also not so high-end that you can only buy the piece once every year or so. Thus, consumers in Bangkok and Thailand, in general, are not very familiar with this concept. The consumption pattern is concentrated just in the two extreme ends of the spectrum. They're also not familiar with experimental fashion jewelry that isn't mass-produced and would need a bit of love and care. As a well-designed brand with edgy jewelry that will last and priced in the middle between high and low-end brands, PATTARAPHAN is slowly changing this mentality and creating a new market in Bangkok.

As for New York's perception of luxury, it is much less afraid of embracing new ideas, especially those that are not conventionally considered luxury elsewhere. High-Pressure Necklace was debuted before the complete Pressure Collection was released. The necklace raised a lot of questions for not just the local consumers, but also the local vendors in Thailand. They could not really understand why I was making jewelry from something regarded as trash and why they would wear such jewelry. This was not really the case in New York. People just got it.

With time, though, High-Pressure Necklace, along with other pieces from this collection, really became a PATTARAPHAN classic that is coveted here in the Bangkok market.

The soda tab jewelry represents the discarded items in urban cities. What was your creative process like in recreating it?

I wanted an exact depiction of the soda tabs in my design. I wanted the shape to be instantly recognized. So I first experimented with actual discarded soda tabs my jewelers and I personally collected. We heavily plated these soda tabs with gold the way we would with the rest of our jewelry. The first prototypes were made with curb chains in the exact lengths I tried on my body. However, the gold plating wore off very easily from these real soda tabs and I wanted something that would last longer for our customers. So I worked with our jewelers to recreate soda tabs in actual sterling silver. The result was one soda tab that exactly replicated a soda tab -- with details like the folded edges -- and the other that was a heavier design with a flat back. It was perfect actually to create two different designs because the collection grew and required different weights of soda tabs.

Contrasting the collection theme, the campaign is symbolic of love and inclusivity. What message do you hope this duality sends to consumers?

I feel like all my life has always been about conflicts, contrasts, and duality. Making gold vermeil jewelry inspired by discarded items to represent anxiety and pressure highlights this ongoing personal story. Dreams is not something you'd expect from Pressure Collection, but it shows the end result of this very special collection and what PATTARAPHAN stands for. From what started as something inspired by trash, the jewelry in real life became precious and tender and is really made for everyone. Like the pieces in the collection, this hopeful campaign shows that something beautiful and precious can blossom from an unexpected place.

Additionally, in a time where love and inclusivity are at the forefront of conversations around the world, as many people are celebrating them while others are fighting for them, I wanted to show them with the brand's core value of authenticity. Talents featured aren't models, but are close friends and family of mine and the photographer, Monique Barron. The campaign displays a super cool mix of a musician from Brooklyn, the photographer's self-portraits, the fabulous Leone twins, my twin sister, and her half-Japanese-half-Kiwi boyfriend as well as many more beautiful souls. What connected all of them was their belief in beautiful things and that their life choices led them to New York. We dream of a beautiful world. And at the end of the day, these are the people who see what I saw back in 2017: the soda tabs on the streets of New York City. And in front of the lens of Monique, they weren't afraid to express their authentic selves. The jewelry is unapologetically representing waste and urbanites' mental health and the campaign continues this authenticity with all these wonderful people who shared the same dreams and values of love and inclusivity.