We were lucky to catch up with Taylor Lanore recently and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Taylor thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What did your parents do right and how has that impacted you in your life and career?
This is something I think about a lot lately! My parents did many things right, but there is one thing in particular that I keep coming back to as the through-line for basically every major decision I’ve made as an adult. Growing up, my mom encouraged me to play sports. Not just one though, nearly all of them. I started as a figure skater, which became a serious competitive endeavor that took me out of school to compete for 13 years. Simultaneously, I was on the swim and dive team for ten years, tried fencing, played soccer, gave field hockey a shot, fumbled spectacularly through chess and golf, and played tennis. I eventually landed in a ballet company and majored in ballet in high school, which turned out to be my great love and something I carried into adulthood.
What I find interesting now is how directly that maps into my career journey. The last decade brought 3 pretty significant pivots across 4 cities, and I think the reason I was able to make those moves without completely falling apart is that I grew up in a house where trying new things was just what you did. In that same vein, you could also walk away when you were ready which was never treated as quitting. It was just information before the next thing you did.
This brings me to present day where I’m currently running my own company, Lanore Fine Jewelry, out of New York City! I’m back in my favorite place on earth and working for myself.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
Howdy! I’m Taylor, the founder of Lanore Fine Jewelry, a custom engagement ring and fine jewelry company based in New York City. I’ve spent a decade in the diamond industry in NYC and SF with past roles at some of the most respected names in the business including Ring Concierge, Lorraine Schwartz, and Lauren B before going out on my own 3.5 years ago. Lanore is really the culmination of everything I learned working at those companies. I specialize in custom engagement rings + all things bridal and work with both mined and lab grown diamonds, but honestly what I actually do is help people navigate one of the most emotionally loaded purchases of their lives without feeling like they have no idea what they’re doing. I think of myself as a diamond therapist vs. a diamond expert for this reason :) The fine jewelry world can feel intimidating and like it operates behind smoke and mirrors, so my goal is to make the experience feel the opposite of that. I call working with Lanore the “no stress express” because designing your engagement ring and selecting a diamond should be very fun and at the end of the day, this type of jewelry represents one of the best parts of life: finding love!
What sets me apart is that I came up on the inside, so I know exactly how the industry works. I know the jewelers, the diamond dealers, where the value is and where it isn’t, and I bring all of that knowledge directly to my clients in a way that feels personal rather than transactional. No one is getting a generic experience and every engagement ring I design and create is built around that person’s lifestyle & personal style.
Something I am most proud of is that I left a very comfortable career in tech to bet on myself and this industry by finally going out on my and starting Lanore full time. It’s growing, my clients are all incredible, and I genuinely love what I do every single day. That does not feel small to me!
Alright – let’s talk about marketing or sales – do you have any fun stories about a risk you’ve taken or something else exciting on the sales and marketing side?
I had this idea for a while that I genuinely thought might be too out there to pitch, but I did it anyway. The concept came from two things I know to be true: luxury club environments are incredible for selling through high ticket concepts, and shopping after a drink is just more fun. Thus I created the Lanore Diamond Martini: a martini that comes with a piece of fine jewelry. You could choose between two martinis, one paired with a 10ctw tennis necklace ($7k) and one with a 5ctw tennis bracelet ($4k).
I pitched it to Delilah in Miami, one of the most coveted venues in the country, and they said yes! We put it on their menu twice, once for Art Basel and once for Miami Music Week, and sold both times. A luxury fine jewelry piece> sold through a cocktail menu> at a nightclub. I still think that’s kind of wild in the best way.
The bigger picture is that this concept proves something I believe: the best place to sell luxury jewelry is not always where you expect it to be. I’m currently building momentum around scaling the Diamond Martini to bigger moments, so stay tuned.
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
This is a big one. After having spent years optimizing for the thing that looked right on paper (the prestigious company, the title, the salary that made sense to everyone around me) I had finally to unlearn that stability = success. While all of those things were genuinely great and I learned an enormous amount, I was also acutely aware that I was building someone else’s vision so that they could live the life I was dreaming about. The backstory is that I left a career at Google to “burn the ships” and do a full send on Lanore in January of this year after having started Lanore right after being hired. Working at Google allowed me to self fund and also comfortably realize that the demand for Lanore was big enough to take seriously. When I tell people that I quit Google, the reaction is usually some version of “that’s terrifying”, which it definitely was. I think for the first 2 months I barely slept, woke up and walked in circles realizing that I was 100% in charge of building my day-to-day structure and sticking to it. However, what I had to unlearn was the idea that the scarier path is the riskier one. Doing something that makes you unhappy or that no longer fits you is also a risk, but it just feels safer because it’s familiar. It’s the career equivalent to staying with the wrong person out of convenience.
What I know now is that everything I did before Lanore was actually preparation for it. A decade on the inside of the diamond industry learning the business at some of the best companies in the space, and then a stint in tech so that I could understand the ins and outs of marketing (which ultimately taught me how to think about brand and scale in a completely different way). None of it was a detour and was instead totally necessary for grand plan.
The lesson I had to unlearn was that the straight line is the smart one. Sometimes the weirdest, most non traditional, winding and hard to explain path is exactly where you need to go.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.lanorefinejewelry.com
- Instagram: @lanorefinejewelry
Image Credits
professional photos: Milan Clarke