Gina Feldman Love’s memories of moments in time

Gina Feldman Love had a “reverence for time” from an early age. “Being on time was very important in my family,” says the lawyer turned designer who co-founded the New York-based jewellery brand Auvere. “My dad would literally drive off if you weren’t on time, so I remember running to catch the car.”

She soon combined her “obsession” with the concept of time with an interest in the pieces that tell it. After moving from Jamaica to the US with her family as a teenager, she collected vintage American watches to occupy herself while her parents shopped in antique stores in the San Francisco Bay Area and Cleveland, Ohio, where they lived. Love also sought out old cameras, which she says capture “a moment in time”, and newspapers featuring significant historical events.

She appreciates the craftsmanship and beauty of watches, which she regards as “incredible pieces of machinery”. Modern designs that she owns include those by Vacheron Constantin, Rolex, and Omega. “I never not have a watch on,” she says.

Benrus (1950s)

Love regards this vintage American watch as a symbol of her legacy, as it was meaningful to both her paternal grandfather and father. She believes her grandfather, who had a construction business in Jamaica, bought it to mark a work achievement when he visited New York in the 1950s.

He later put the piece on the wrist of Love’s father, a chemical engineer, to celebrate his promotion. The gesture “represented something big” for her dad, says Love, because it had been a “source of contention” for her grandfather that her father had not joined the family business.

Looking at the watch, which her mother gave to her recently, “brings all the memories up” for Love. Her father wore the stainless steel piece, which has an overlay of gold, on special occasions, including her graduation from William & Mary Law School in Virginia.

Ebel Wave (early 2000s)

Love’s first “really good” watch was the Ebel that her parents gifted her to mark her graduation and starting her first job in law. The stainless steel piece has 18-carat gold around the bezel. “It was a beautiful, interesting, practical watch,” says Love.

She no longer wears the piece, preferring watches with larger faces, but would never part with it. “I’m not a seller of the things I love or that were given to me with love,” she says.

Pasha de Cartier (2007)

Love replaced the Ebel as her everyday watch with a stainless steel Cartier when she joined law firm Shearman & Sterling (now A&O Shearman) in 2007. “It represented a move upward for me, both in terms of my career and the watch,” she says.

Even though she was already “very sensitive to time”, her demanding career in property law was based on billable hours, meaning timekeeping was critical. The watch was also part of the “armour” she wore to “portray a certain sense of confidence and clarity and decisiveness”.

Audemars Piguet Royal Oak (mid-2000s)

Love had been a fan of the Royal Oak since childhood, drawn by the octagonal shape of the bezel. She had intended to buy the mostly stainless steel version. “But I lost my mind when I saw the [18-carat yellow] gold one,” she says.

After quitting law and paying off her loans, she bought the pre-owned watch in 2017 to both celebrate her legal career and mark her new life as a jewellery designer. She and husband Steven Feldman launched Auvere, a jewellery brand focused on high-carat gold, that year.

“I said, ‘Screw it, I’m gonna spend everything I have and get the watch I absolutely, absolutely adore,’” she says. “‘It’ll be with me forever and I won’t regret it.’ And I never have.”

Love, who had taken classes in handbag design and created leather goods brand Peryton, says her favourite watch is “a bit ostentatious”. “But I wanted a watch, honestly, that paid me back for all of the tortured years as a lawyer,” she says.

Leff Amsterdam Tube (2022)

While the brand of a watch is a consideration for Love, she does like “pure design”. When furnishing her apartment, she bought a sculptural sofa by Dutch designer Piet Hein Eek. She then explored his other work and came across the Tube watch, which he designed for watch brand Leff Amsterdam in 2015.

While many of her pieces have an emotional connection, she bought her all-black 42mm-case Tube as a fun “fashion choice”. “I can barely even tell the time on it, but it has a look to it that I love,” she says. “And, since I tend to wear a lot of black, it gives me that feeling of being a Batman.”

For her next piece, she would like to own a Patek Philippe, which she regards as “one of the pinnacles of watches”. She likes how good pieces, while tellers of time, also “stand the test of time”. Love’s reverence for timekeeping remains strong.