Sweet Jane's Chains

Hi My Name is Charity Janisse but you can call me Jane or Jani. I created my small boutique DIY jewelry business Sweet Jane’s Chains back in 2006. Creativity has always been my favorite method to unwind and take my mind off things and as I was going through a rather turbulent time in my life, I began stringing beads to chill out. It became such a fantastic outlet that I soon had more necklace than I could possibly wear or even give away!

As this was all happening around the time MySpace was taking off and social media was becoming a thing for the first time, I thought it couldn’t hurt to set up an eBay shop and post some my collection online. I wasn’t sure what to call myself as Social Media was relatively new and I wasn’t really comfortable having my full name and details out there for anyone to see and with my name being Charity anyway I didn’t want to confuse people and have them think I was a cause of some sort. I thought of my last name, Janisse, and that I had friends who called me Jane or Jani, there might be something there. Being called Jane by some had always just been a thing. I’d been a fan of Jane’s Addiction in the 90’s seeing them at events like Lollapalooza and happily dancing to “Jane’s Says” like they wrote the song just for me. And my all time favorite song was “Sweet Jane” by the Velvet Underground. Though that band was a bit before my time, something about that song, so many of their songs, just felt like they we written for me too. So I thought Jane or even better Sweet Jane! Then I asked myself what’s catchy, Sweet Jane’s Jewels, Sweet Jani’s Gems? And as I had tossed around the name Charity’s Chains for quite some time before I finally realized Charity would just not be a fit, I finally decided on “Sweet Jane’s Chains” and it stuck! The vibe was indie, punk, pin-up girl and I modeled all the jewelry myself before I began meeting tons of others that modeled too! Here’s a Myspace pic taken around the time I was tossing around Biz Name ideas and planning my first launch of SJC. 🙂

My sister was a huge supporter, she took a wonderful set of pictures of me for SJC (all the pics of me in black below) and she modeled too!

I also quickly discovered being online, in a space to meet new people with similar interests away from my day to day life and regular world was a blast. I had been raised in a very conservative environment and had felt like I had been reining myself in for years and this was a place to be completely me! No questions asked, no judgement from others etc, it was spectacular! One reason I’d gotten into the Punk Scene at 15 was to have a way to get away from it all. To be me, to be known and unknown all at once and to have people know from the moment they met me, that I wasn’t going to fit in or try to. I’d always been a bit of an outsider, the punk world was perfect. In the late 80’s and early 90’s when I was teen alternative style was much more uncommon than it is today. 🙂 So in 2005 and 6, I was thrilled to discover Myspace right when the whole Emo/Indie Scene was taking off. I fit right in there too and so did my style and alternative jewelry creations.

So Sweet Jane’s Chains was born. Social media was oddly very easy for me from the start, it was a world I thrived in, which was the last thing I expected as I am honestly a very private person. But before long I had 25,000 friends and my little DIY jewelry business was booming! I was meeting all kinds of fascinating people. People who, as they bought my jewelry, began posting pictures of themselves in the creations and letting me share those images. It was so exciting and my jewelry was featured in several magazines as well as some Indie Celebs giving me shout outs, it was a fabulous time!

Here are a few pictures from Sweet Jane’s Chains early 2000’s heyday. I would have to dive into my photo bucket and email to get all the pics and add names, so for the moment I’ll just share a few pictures I have handy. I never had anyone sign contracts or anything when modeling my jewelry so I don’t know all the rights about posting the pictures years later, but if anyone comes across this blog and doesn’t want their pictures posted just email me at sweetjaneschains@gmail.com and I’ll gladly take them down, or email me any details you’d like shared with your pictures. 🙂 And if you’d like to model jewelry again, email me that too! I’m sending some free necklaces to models that want to work with me! Sweet Jane’s Chains has always been about being real, being unique, being yourself, so the photos go from casual selfies to professional photo shoots and everything in between. That is what I still plan to do. This was always just for fun, and for me and others to express their authentic selves. I’m excited to see what happens next as I reopen in October!! I have tons more pics and I intend to create galleries with all of them.

 In 2007 I ran a competition for Sweet Jane’s Official Pin-Up Girl! It was a blast, tons of people entered, everyone was voting with likes and on Valentines I announced the winner. Here’s the Sweet Jane’s Chains Official Pin-Up Girl in the jewelry I made for her and corset she won from another DIY artist I was working with at the time.

Here is a set of photos of all the stunners in the competition. I have tons more wonderful pics of people modeling SJC that I plan to share soon! And I am excited to say I am still in touch with a few of these Lovelies and they will be modeling my creations for the relaunch!!

The MySpace years were so much fun and selling in my eBay shop was a great side income and overall it was just so good to have a space where I could get away from it all and just have fun!

In 2009 things in my life and on social media went through some big changes! I had a baby and got super busy with a newborn and Facebook became a thing slowly replacing MySpace and Facebook was a different world. It was not quite so anonymous. It was hard to network without bumping into immediate family and real life friends at every turn and the Biz Pages were extremely hard to promote without spending money I think, I don’t know because I didn’t spend any. But it was so hard to get anyone besides immediate family and friends to see and follow the business page. I didn’t feel comfortable posting more of my playful risqué photos with family members to see, it felt weird honestly and I was losing touch with a lot of my MySpace friends as they were moving to Facebook as well and mostly in their RL friend and family groups too. With all the changes and working full time with a baby, I couldn’t keep up with MySpace. I ultimately deleted my page, I always like going out on a high note and that’s what I did.

I continued to create jewelry over the years, set up an Etsy shop though I hardly used it as I switched to selling at local fairs and markets. But last May I decided to create a new collection and reopen Sweet Jane’s Chains online! It’s taking a minute as my full time gig as a youtuber and side job as a painter also keeps me crazy busy, but I have been doing tons behind the scenes to get ready for the SJC reopening! have set up all the social media, got my Etsy shop reopened and have reached out to some of the models I have stayed in touch with all this time. I am creating tons of new jewelry and have set a launch date for my online shop. I’m so excited to be selling online again soon and I can’t wait to see where this new chapter of SJC will lead and who I will meet, but I am so ready!

In the years in between I have become a YouTuber, I have published a book and spent many years networking mostly as an artist, poet and urbex photographer. I’ve shared a ton of my artwork online and exhibited locally and internationally. I never stop creating, I always have one project or another, and as you can see from the jewelry I’m wearing in this new set of profile photos I took May of this year, I still make and wear Sweet Jane’s Chains. 🙂

Here are the new SweetJane’s Chains social media links. I have been a bit quiet as I am still working on all the jewelry for the shop opening but please follow for there will be much more to see. Lots and Lots of Love! XoXoX

Yours Truly, Sweet Jane 😉

https://www.instagram.com/sweetjanechains

https://www.facebook.com/sweetjaneschains