Gia Coppola knows friendship isn’t just about the big, life-changing moments—it’s about the smaller, more subtle ones too.
Those fleeting in-between times—like grocery shopping ahead of a big trip with friends, or anxiously comparing notes when you’re debating quitting your job—are the basis for the writer-director’s new campaign for jewelry brand Mejuri. The three-part series, titled A New York Minute, sees model Laura Love and her real-life trusted circle of friends in conversation as they’re going through daily life wearing some of Mejuri’s signature pieces, including chunky hoops, stackable rings, and chain-link bracelets.
For Coppola, capturing the magic of the mundane was a purposeful decision. “The team came up with this concept of ‘a day in the life,’ and these moments that are kind of the diverging point in your early 30s if you’re a young woman,” Coppola tells Harper’s Bazaar of the new campaign, in an exclusive interview. “[At the Director’s Bureau,] we were talking about this point that I remember very well: when all your group of friends are starting to really split off into these different points in your life. It was really about noticing how the most memorable times are kind of the ones that aren’t labeled your memorable moments.”
The filmmaker was also inspired by one of the special women in her own life: her grandmother Eleanor Coppola, who died in April.
“In the midst of all this, my grandma had passed away, and so I was reverting back to her experimental art films to sort of feel closer to her,” Coppola says. “I was like, well, let’s bring in this kind of meditative approach. I always call it the extraordinary in the ordinary—she found interest and beauty in everything.”
For Mejuri chief brand officer Jacob Jordan, Coppola was the perfect director to capture a story of womanhood, friendship, and community, with the eclectic energy of New York City as an unofficial extra character.
“I’ve always been such a huge fan of Gia's work, and just the fact that a project like this could be of interest to her got me super excited,” Jordan says. “How Gia and her team interpreted this idea of the series … they took it to this place that was so far beyond anything I could have actually imagined. The films are relatable to people’s lives, and ultimately to our customers—it showcases the kind of inner dialogues that we all have with ourselves. A lot of the decisions that you make in your life are impacted by the people you have around you, and this project is really a celebration of that.”
Shooting the campaign in New York City, a place where Coppola doesn’t often get to work, provided a new perspective for the director.
“We all bonded over that idea of when you open the window in New York City and the sounds just sort of blare out at you. In your 30s, too, there’s that sort of hustle and bustle, and how you’re sort of diverging in different ways—are you going to settle down, or are you gonna quit your job and start something new for yourself? It just felt like the right landscape for this,” says Coppola. “It’s just great to encourage people to acknowledge that and celebrate it.”
The first full episode of the A New York Minute series drops on mejuri.com on September 16. A preview of the three-part series is available to view above.
Shop Mejuri
Chunky Large Hoops
Pearl and Diamond Stacker Ring
Diamond Necklace
Dome Earrings
Bianca Betancourt is the culture editor at HarpersBAZAAR.com, where she covers all things film, TV, music, and more. When she's not writing, she loves impulsively baking a batch of cookies, re-listening to the same early-2000s pop playlist, and stalking Mariah Carey's Twitter feed.
