"I realized there was a jewelry studio here during my second day of orientation," she said. "And I haven't left since."
As a senior jewelry fellow, Berlinger has spent the past year working on a project to link jewelrymaking with women and identity. Using the project to combine her love for jewelry and her major in sociology, Berlinger explored the jewelry's power to help the wearer craft an identity. In addition to writing a 60-page paper, she opened an exhibition in the Black Family Visual Arts Center last week and will produce a jewelry line that she plans to sell after graduation.
When she began researching, Berlinger noticed a dearth of literature about contemporary designers' role in creating powerful pieces.
"Modern fashion is generally being dictated by women, and yet none of the designers are willing to declare themselves as feminist," she said.
Many jewelry specialists she interviewed were initially reluctant to talk about the influence of their work.
"A lot of them just wanted to tell me about their spring line," she said. "I wanted to talk about jewelry's effect on women wearing it."
Jewelry and fashion have been historically analyzed as being anti-feminist. "Women were told what to wear, what's sexy. But now, in the modern industry, women dominate it. It's about female empowerment," Berlinger said.
From one designer, Berlinger learned how jewelry can be empowering through its sheer physicality.
"Wearing a three-inch cuff on your arm will make you feel more protected and empowered than a dainty necklace," she said.
At the opening of her exhibition on May 3, viewers were struck by the intensity of her work.
"Jewelry can sometimes be represented in an almost demeaning way, but I think what she's made me think about differently is how much of a personal statement you can make with jewelry," Sophia Archibald '13 said.
Archibald said she felt almost Amazonian while modeling Berlinger's jewelry.
"I'm wearing a piece that involves leather shoulder pads and chains. On a physical level, the weight makes me hold myself differently. It gives me more of a presence, or makes me give myself more of a presence," she said.
Berlinger looked at jewelry as a measure of female worth and beauty, and each collection in the exhibition represents a different theme.
"It really was like armor, and yet at the same time, there was a sophisticated beauty to it," Randall Stacy '14 said while observing the pieces.
Julian MacMillan '14 called the works "beautiful and unlike other jewelry I've seen."
"Some of the pieces were bold and arresting, some were subtle and intriguing," he said.
Students noted the large crowd that came out to support Berlinger's exhibition.
"Michelle took a risk and it really paid off," Anup Choudhary '13 said. "Exhibits like hers show people that Dartmouth will support a student pursuing her passion, and that it can lead to tangible results that could even jump-start a career."
Though the pieces are owned by the College, Berlinger intends to buy them back and hopefully sell them through her own jewelry business in Brooklyn after graduation.
She has been working on her project, titled "Jewelry and the Modern Woman," since last summer. Archibald described the senior jewelry fellowship as a "thesis on crack."
"It's such a huge project, and it's so personal," she said. "She's kind of broken the boundaries of jewelry. They're very much decoration pieces, not just trinkets."
A large challenge for Berlinger through these last few months was teaching herself to work with materials like leather and gold.
"I'd never worked with fine gold before," she said. "You can't mess up. That's a $500 mistake."
*Archibald is a former member of The Dartmouth staff. *
