Our business was born and raised in New York City. The first apartment I lived in solo was on Ludlow Street, on the Lower East Side, two blocks from where my grandmother was born in 1909. It's also where I started making jewelry. Lindsay reminds me often that rats would hurl themselves at my window late at night, keeping me awake. Why did they do this? I don't know. The Victorians bejeweled all kinds of animals: dogs, horses, foxes. We stuck red rubies in our hand-carved rat's eyes. If you're a native New Yorker, you coexist with rats. The city belongs to us all.