from “le détroit” · the strait
The Detroit jewelry maker, which turns fallen graffiti into wearable art and trains women facing barriers to work, has moved its headquarters into Eastern Market.
Rebel Nell, the Detroit jewelry company that turns fallen graffiti into wearable art, has a new home in Eastern Market. The company announced the move in November 2024, relocating its headquarters out of the Elijah McCoy area and into the market district at 1948 Division Street, per the company's own listings and a report in Crain's Detroit Business.
The new space is built to do several jobs at once. Rebel Nell describes it as the place where it crafts its jewelry, sells it at retail, and hosts events such as team-building sessions and mural-making workshops. The location keeps manufacturing and creative work under one roof while putting a storefront in one of the busiest market districts in the country.
Rebel Nell was founded in 2013 by Amy Peterson and Diana Roginson. Its signature material is repurposed graffiti, the layered paint chips that flake off Detroit's older buildings and land on the ground, where the team collects them. Cut in cross-section, each chip carries its own pattern of color, which is why the company calls its work one of a kind. Over the years it has also worked Detroit history into its pieces, drawing on materials tied to landmarks including the old J.L. Hudson's, the Packard Plant, the demolished Joe Louis Arena, and the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island. The company sells dedicated collections built around sites such as Michigan Central Station and Hudson's.
The jewelry is the visible half of the business. The mission is the other half. Rebel Nell employs and trains women facing barriers to work, many of them transitioning out of shelters, pairing on-the-job jewelry making with life-management, financial, and business education. By the company's own count it has employed more than 40 women and graduated more than 36 into the traditional workforce.
The name nods to Eleanor Roosevelt, whose childhood nickname was Little Nell. The company recasts that nickname as something with more fight in it, a frame it ties to the women it hires and the futures they build.
"The beauty in our jewelry is as important as the mission behind our craft," co-founder and CEO Amy Peterson says on the company's site.
Rebel Nell also operates a downtown Detroit studio in Parker's Alley and a store in Grand Rapids. The Eastern Market move plants its home base among the butchers, distillers, and makers who fill the district's industrial buildings, a fitting set of neighbors for a company that builds its product out of the city itself.
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