30 years of Pyrrha: How two Vancouver creatives built a global jewellery brand by accident

Pyrrha has developed a cult-like following around the globe thanks to its unique vintage aesthetic. Its pieces—cast from antique Victorian wax seals—have been spotted on some of the biggest celebrities in the world, including Taylor Swift, Andrew Garfield and Reese Witherspoon. Founders and married couple Wade and Danielle Papin, who came with no formal training as jewellers, didn’t quite envision the company in its current iteration 30 years ago. “I actually went to school for journalism and Danielle studied photography,” Wade laughs in a candid chat at Pyrrha’s impressive six-floor Vancouver studio in Mount Pleasant. “We were both working full-time jobs and hating them.”

Pyrrha was born by fluke in 1995 after Danielle—a crafty soul—created a bespoke bent metal bracelet with beads. “My friend was like, ‘That’s cool!’—and asked me to make one for her,” Danielle recalls. At the time, Danielle—newly dating Wade—had her sights set on a pair of expensive shoes. “I was so not business-minded, but Wade gave me the idea that if I made more bracelets and sold them, I could get the shoes I wanted,” she explains. And so, Pyrrha—its name borrowed from ancient Greek mythology—organically grew in the duo’s spare apartment bedroom with limited equipment. “We were totally winging it,” Wade says of Pyrrha’s earliest days. “It was so dusty! We had no ventilation in that back room. We finally asked some people in the jewellery space about what tools we actually needed.”

For the first decade, Pyrrha had a very different look: Wade and Danielle experimented with a variety of shapes, colours and metals—creating new collections several times a year. “We had this vision of big, chunky pieces,” Wade explains. The brand ended up in Vancouver’s most popular contemporary jewellery boutique: Nancy Hill’s Blue Ruby. “We had to fight to get in there but I feel the Hill family was the first to do all sorts of retail things in the city,” Wade remarks, referring to the entrepreneurial legacy of Hill’s of Kerrisdale, its subsequent spin-off Hill’s Dry Goods and Aritzia (founded by Hill family scion, Brian.)

In 2005, Wade and Danielle stumbled upon a box of antique Victorian wax seals at an estate sale, sparking the idea to try something new in the jewellery space—and, ultimately, to evolve Pyrrha. “We thought they would be really different from anything else we’ve done or seen,” Danielle says of the brand’s silver talisman necklaces, inspired by the seals. After some trial and error, the couple settled on designs with an antique finish—now the label’s signature offering.

The brand caught the attention of Reese Witherspoon after she spotted her agent wearing one of the distinctive pieces. Shortly after, the same agent asked if the design duo had any plans to be in Los Angeles. “We were so green; we thought, ‘Let’s just get down there.’ So we said we were going to be in L.A. that weekend—which wasn’t our plan at all,” Wade recalls. The meeting paid off, sparking an early connection with Taylor Swift—who’s since bought around 20 pieces—and Julia Roberts, who wore a signature Pyrrha necklace in the 2017 film Wonder. Witherspoon continued to keep her eye on the line, too. In 2006, she recommended the Canadian brand to popular California boutique Fred Segal and even commissioned Wade and Danielle to create a custom piece after wrapping her film Penelope.

Despite the widespread Hollywood following, Pyrrha has never paid any talent to wear their pieces. “That’s one of the reasons we’ve maintained integrity: people buy Pyrrha because they connect with it… our pieces are meaningful for them,” Wade says.

The same ethos has also applied to the company’s internal operations: Pyrrha is proudly a sustainable B Corp business, a member of the Responsible Jewellery Council and a certified living wage employer in B.C. for their team of 30. “We’ve always lived our lives this way and we wanted Pyrrha to be a reflection of our values,” Danielle says, explaining all aspects of the business are managed in-house—from design and production to photography, sales and more.

While Pyrrha has considered expansion—“I would love to do housewares,” Wade admits—it’s unlikely that outside investors will be part of that growth. “We never took any outside money. Pyrrha has always been fully under our control,” says Wade. “We’ve always been the people making the decisions and doing the designing.”

Although the brand operated a Los Angeles boutique for several years, keeping their headquarters firmly planted in Vancouver has been imperative for the married couple—who are also parents to 13-year-old daughter Hazel.

“We would never move out of Vancouver. We’re proud our line is all made here from start to finish and still is, as it’s always been,” Danielle explains.

When asked about a favourite Pyrrha talisman from their three-decade-long journey, Danielle quickly points to the one around her neck—the inscription on it serves as her personal motto. “I’ve always worn this one, which reads, ‘Love conquers all.’ This is one of the first ones we ever made,” Danielle reveals. “As people who are married and doing business—it’s an important thing to stand by.”