Fashion / Style

Nancy Pelosi Proudly Wears Houston Necklace in Her State of the Union Moment

Iconic Design From Masterson Gains Political Fame

BY // 02.06.19

Love Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi or hate her, as a Texan, you’ve gotta love the necklace that she wore with her white suit for Tuesday night’s  State of the Union address. It’s one of the iconic designs for which Houston jewelry designer and artist Mariquita Masterson has gained fame.

While the Internet is filled with discourse on the speaker’s assorted necklace collection, Tuesday night’s choice has had Houston Facebook posts and texts buzzing as everyone familiar with Masterson’s work recognized the signature glass bauble, “the drip,” that defines all of the artist’s jewelry creations.

The one-of-a-kind piece is crafted with a recycled red-glass pendant set in sterling silver and strung with blue agate beads. It was purchased by Pelosi’s daughter, Jacqueline Kenneally, who lives in Houston and frequently hosts her mother here. She selected the piece from the myriad designs featured at Masterson’s eponymous River Oaks Boulevard showroom. Necklaces of similar design retail for $650.

“This is amazing,” Masterson tells PaperCity. “We’re very excited and we’re having a lot of fun at the store . . . I can’t tell you how many texts everybody is getting.”

She recalls that Kenneally was thrilled to find a necklace in patriotic red and blue and that it was presented to Pelosi as a gift from her daughters. The red came from Kugler glass rods ordered from Germany while the blue agate is a rare find. The only remaining item in the agate is a pair of earrings.

Masterson began creating her jewelry more than three decades ago, first crafting her pieces from recycled glass, i.e. green and blue gin bottles. Earrings, pendants, necklaces and rings are today created from recycled glass as well as from glass companies with the ability to offer a wide variety of colors and textures. As her publicist notes, “And sometimes she gets lucky and an antique vase shows up in pieces and she gets to make something beautiful out of the wreckage.” And that we would like to see.

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Not wanting to take credit for the full breadth of the Masterson oeuvre, the jewelry queen explains, “Everybody pitches in with ideas.” That includes, she notes, Stanley Greer, her daughter Libbie Masterson and son Harry.

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